Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

LONDON REGIONAL TRANSPORT (PENALTY FARES) BILL [Lords]

Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Question [10 November].

Hon. Members: Object.

Debate to be resumed on Thursday at Seven o'clock.

AVON LIGHT RAILWAY TRANSIT BILL [Lords]

Ordered,
That the Promoters of the Avon Light Rail Transit Bill [Lords] shall have leave to suspend proceedings thereon in order to proceed with the Bill if they think fit, in the next Session of Parliament, provided that the Agents for the Bill give notice to the Clerks in the Private Bill Office of their intention to suspend further proceedings not later than the day before the close of the present Session and that all Fees due on the Bill up to that date be paid;

Ordered,
That, if the Bill is brought from the Lords in the next Session, the Agents for the Bill shall deposit in the Private Office a declaration signed by them, stating that the Bill is the same, in every respect, as the Bill which was brought from the Lords in the present Session;

Ordered,
That as soon as a certificate by one of the Clerks in the Private Bill Office, that such a declaration has been so deposited, has been laid upon the Table of the House, the Bill shall be deemed to have been read the first time and shall be ordered to be read a second time;

Ordered,
That all Petitions against the Bill presented in the present Session which stand referred to the Committee on the Bill shall stand referred to the Committee on the Bill in the next Session;

Ordered,
That no Petitioners shall be heard before the Committee on the Bill, unless their Petition has been presented within the time limited within the present Session or deposited pursuant to paragraph (b) of Standing Order 126 relating to Private Business;

Ordered,
That, in relation to the Bill, Standing Order 127 relating to Private Business shall have effect as if the words "under Standing Order 126 (Reference to committee of petitions against Bill)" were omitted;

Ordered,
That no further Fees shall be charged in respect of any proceedings on the Bill in respect of which Fees have already been incurred during the present Session;

Ordered,
That these Orders be Standing Orders of the House.—[The Chairman of Ways and Means.]

CITY OF LONDON (SPITALFIELDS MARKET) BILL

LONDON LOCAL AUTHORITIES BILL [Lords]

Orders read for consideration of motions.

Hon. Members: Object.

To be considered on Thursday at Seven o'clock.

Oral Answers to Questions — SOCIAL SECURITY

Unemployed and Low-paid (Support)

Mr. Michael: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what he estimates will be the combined effect of the various changes in Government support for unemployed and low-paid people, including the impact of the freeze on child benefit and all other relevant decisions; and what he estimates will be the net effect in cash terms and percentage terms on the weekly income of a couple with two children with (a) no earner in the family, (b) a single earner on £100 per week and (c) a single earner on £150 a week.

The Minister of State, Department of Social Security (Mr. Nicholas Scott): Next April's uprating directs substantial extra help towards lower income families. All children's personal allowances in income support, family credit and housing benefit are being increased by 50p over and above the amount needed to maintain their real value. Higher children's allowances in family credit and housing benefit will maintain the cash gap and encourage people with families to work rather than be unemployed. However, it will not be possible to say what the overall effects on families will be until income tax rates and allowances, and changes in real earnings, are known in April.

Mr. Michael: In the light of that obscure reply, will the Minister consider the position of an unemployed family on moderate rent and rates, with two children aged 14 and 16 years? Does he agree that if the father moves from being unemployed to a job paying £100 a week he will be less than £7 better off in terms of money in his pocket, with the greatly increased costs attached to employment such as travel to work? If the man moves to employment that pays £150 a week, will the Minister accept that he will be only £8 a week better off as a result, with further losses in benefit? Does the Minister agree that there is a worsening poverty trap? The Chancellor of the Exchequer is throwing money at the rich, but he is doing nothing for the poor—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman's long supplementary question is unfair on those who will follow him. I appeal to hon. Members to ask short questions.

Mr. Scott: A number of factors, not least the growth in earnings, could have a profound effect on the net position in which people find themselves next April. Assuming an uprating in line with inflation, my calculations for the hon. Gentleman's two examples are £10 and £20 respectively, not £7 and £8. The essential feature is that in both


instances the man would be better off by working. Under the system over which the Opposition presided, he could well have been worse off.

Mr. Jack: Does my hon. Friend agree that the proposed computerisation of social security offices will do much to ensure that benefit claimants receive the benefits to which they are entitled, and will deal with much of the criticism of the service that is offered by local offices?

Mr. Scott: We have already taken some important steps to improve the service that we deliver to the public from local offices. We are determined to continue with the improvement. We are introducing the largest computerisation programme that there has ever been in Western Europe. When that has been completed in 1991, I am sure that we shall be in an even better position than we are now.

Mr. Kirkwood: Does the Minister accept that the changes in April heralded an increased emphasis on targeting? Has he had a chance to study the report of the Citizens Advice Bureaux, in which it is stated that 82 per cent. of claimants were worse off after the April changes? Does that not cast doubt on the Government's policy of increasing the targeting of benefits?

Mr. Scott: I have the highest regard for much of the CAB's work, but I believe that the report was flawed in two important respects. The conculsions that were drawn from it were even more flawed. First, the work was carried out only one month after the new benefits were introduced in April 1987. Secondly, it would not be surprising if claimants were unsure about their entitlement under the new system, because it had been introduced so recently. The sample consisted of people who were sufficiently worried to go into the citizens advice bureaux. So it was not typical of the broad mass of income support recipients.

Mr. Robert G. Hughes: Is my hon. Friend able to make any comparison between this Government's record in that area and that of the Labour Government run by the then right hon. Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth?

Mr. Scott: The most important point is that our predecessors in the Department of Health and Social Security and the Government as a whole had the courage to tackle the ramshackle structure of supplementary benefits and associated benefits and to replace them with something that is simpler and easier for staff to administer and for claimants to understand and which removes the worst aspects of the poverty and unemployment traps.

Mr. Flynn: Following the Minister's non-answer to the question raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth (Mr. Michael), does he agree that recent changes have increased the size of the poverty trap, leaving millions of families floundering on low incomes with their escape route cut off? Does he agree also that someone may still lose more than £1 in income by earning an extra £1? Some families need to earn an extra £90 a week to increase their income by a mere £18. What does the Minister intend to do to help those families? What lifeline will he offer them when he has needlessly added the humiliation of poverty to those who already suffer the daily insult of low pay and unemployment?

Mr. Scott: I warmly welcome the hon. Member to his new responsibilities and look forward to crossing swords with him in the future. We have deliberately put an extra

£70 million into uprating to provide special help for low income families whether on income support or in work. As I said earlier, it is all very well to claim that we still suffer from some aspects of the poverty and unemployment traps as a result of the need to withdraw benefit as earnings increase. Not many people would disagree with that. However, the Labour party in government presided over a system in which gross imcomes could double before there was any net increase in take-home pay. We have abolished that.

Brent Offices

Mr. Boateng: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security whether he has any proposals to close social security offices in Brent.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Peter Lloyd): No, Sir, but one may move to better premises in the district.

Mr. Boateng: When will a final decision be taken about the relocation of offices in my constituency? Does the Minister recognise that the freeze on staff pending relocation is causing a deterioration in the service at existing offices in Brent? Will he undertake to consult local advice agencies, for example, the citizens advice bureau, law centres and the housing advice centre, before taking a final decision?

Mr. Lloyd: We intend to take a decision very shortly. I realise that the delay in taking the decision does not help the local staff situation, particularly as the problem that led to the decision to relocate stemmed from the difficulty of retaining and recruiting staff, which meant that services to claimants have not been as good as they should be. As it is a matter of improving services to the constituents of the hon. Member and others in Brent and inner London, we are sure that the agencies to which he referred will be pleased with the result in due course.

Family Credit

Mr. Frank Field: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what are the latest figures for the take-up of family credit.

The Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. John Moore): Since the start of the new scheme, just over 400,000 claims have been received. At the end of October over 248,000 families were receiving family credit. In addition, on the latest information available, 56,400 claims were on hand, but in 36,4000 of those we were waiting for replies to inquiries to employers or to the claimant.

Mr. Field: By what date do the Government expect to achieve their 60 per cent. target take-up of family credit? Given that child benefit was frozen to target resources on the poorest, if that modest target is not met by then, will the Government reconsider their strategy?

Mr. Moore: The figure is still nothing like as good as I should like it to be. It is nearly 40 per cent., and there has been a slower start than we expected. I expect to see encouragement from hon. Members on both sides of the House, because I remember that Opposition Members thought, sensibly, that family credit was an intelligent way in which to help families.
The hon. Gentleman will join me in being delighted that although the take-up rate is not what we should like it to be—I shall not give a date because we are about to introduce new take-up campaigns—the amount of money being expended, which is of relevance to the issue, is in excess of the £400 million that we thought might be available in this area; in other words, more than double what was going to family income supplement.

Mr. Couchman: As an employer of many part-time staff who are not on generous incomes, I am not aware of ever having been informed either of the former FIS or of family credit. Will my right hon. Friend, when he sends out national insurance notification in the next few weeks, inform employers accordingly, so that they may advise their staff of this benefit's availability?

Mr. Moore: My hon. Friend makes a very good point. I had thought that the Department of Employment carried out a programme during the latter part of the summer to attract the attention of employers, both large and small, to the opportunities that exist and the current position. We are considering this area, as I clearly said in the uprating statement, and repeat now. Those who would like to see people in low-paid work should note the sensible remarks of the hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) in an article in The Guardian on 9 November when he said that the objective of welfare policy for the 1990s should be to reward people on low incomes who try to improve their own and their family's lot. Any extra activities in that area from all parts of the House that can enhance that objective will be welcome.

Mr. Andrew MacKay: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the disturbingly low level of family credit take-up could be improved if one could ensure that the mother was more often the recipient?

Mr. Moore: I tried reminding the House in the uprating statement, and I re-checked before questions today, that the mother is the person able and liable to claim family credit. Several right hon. and hon. Members seem to be in some doubt about this point, but that is provided for under the Social Security (Claims and Payments) Amendment Regulations 1987, under section 1(1)A of the Social Security Act 1986. It is clear that only in exceptional circumstances will family credit go to the father rather than to the mother.

Mr. Wigley: Is the Secretary of State aware of the difficulties faced by the self-employed and those on low pay—especially those working in small-scale agriculture or tourism? Is the Minister aware also of the requirements imposed by local offices for applicants to produce audited accounts for the six months prior to the date of their claim? Is he further aware of the tremendous bureaucratic imposition and cost that that requirement involves? Has the right hon. Gentleman yet found a way of streamlining the procedure so payments may be made more quickly to people in need?

Mr. Moore: The hon. Gentleman makes a sensible contribution, because we all have the same purpose in mind. There has been some debate on the point that he raises. The intention was to improve the opportunity for such employers. Consultations are under way and I hope

that the very point that the hon. Gentleman makes will be taken out of debate, because I want to see take-up encouraged rather than discouraged.

Mr. Robin Cook: Has the Secretary of State forgotten that there is a long history of means-tested benefits failing to hit their targets? Does he recollect that family income supplement never reached more than half those entitled to receive it? Now that family credit has failed to achieve even that pass mark, why does the right hon. Gentleman not accept that if he really wants to target help on mothers, the only guaranteed way of doing so is through a decent level of child benefit?

Mr. Moore: I hope that the hon. Gentleman will consider more carefully at this early stage of family credit the proposition that seems to be creating difficulty for his party. I refer to the moral difficulty in which he might find himself in trying to disagree in the long term with serious attempts to help specifically families in work on low incomes. I would have thought that ours was the sensible way to address national policy, whereas in an interesting magazine interview that I read in the latter part of the summer, the hon. Gentleman makes it clear—[Interruption.] I know that the hon. Member has difficulty with some of his hon. Friends below the Gangway, but I shall endeavour to answer the specific points that he made in a long article in Poverty, in referring to the nature of what I thought was his party's views on the subject:
The objectives of the Government in redefining the welfare benefit system away from the concept of a national social insurance which protects everybody into a system which helps only those who, as they put it, are in need … What we propose is the precise reverse.
That does not seem to be the view of the hon. Member for Birkenhead. When the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) is less confused, I hope that he will join me in trying to target additional help more effectively through family credit.

Personal Pensions

Mr. Summerson: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what special financial incentives are being provided for people to take out personal pensions.

Mr. Peter Lloyd: People who take out personal pensions before April 1989 can backdate membership to April 1987. They are also eligible from that date for the special 2 per cent. incentive payment, which is payable until April 1993.

Mr. Summerson: I thank my hon. Friend for that reply and congratulate him on his first appearance on the Front Bench. How many people have opted to take out personal pensions since the new arrangements were introduced earlier this year?

Mr. Lloyd: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I can tell him that 110 schemes have been set up and that 102,000 individuals have taken out personal pensions. If my hon. Friend would like to look at the Financial Times of 31 October, he will see a report which says that the figure
from a straw poll of life companies, shows … the personal pensions market was extremely buoyant in its first three months.

Mrs. Mahon: Does the Minister agree that, given the small numbers on state earnings-related pensions receiving more than £15 a week—33,000 men and just over 4,000


women—the decision to reduce that entitlement in 1999 should be reversed? Will the hon. Gentleman draw those small numbers receiving just £15 a week to the attention of the Chancellor, who believes that there are large numbers?

Mr. Lloyd: It is an excellent time to make a necessary change when so few numbers will be affected. The problem in the next century will be the burden on the working population. The alternatives which we have introduced will mean that more and more people will have a second pension. They will be properly funded. Those people will not be a burden on the working population. Indeed, they will find additional finance for investment in industry.

Staffing

Mr. Sumberg: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what action he has taken in response to the findings of the Moodie report on social security staffing.

Mr. Moore: I have made clear my determination to secure improvements in service to the public. My Department's investment of £1·2 billion in developing our operational strategy is directed at that objective. So is the Moodie report on our local office network. I commissioned it and I welcomed it on its publication in June. I have already accepted in principle its recommendation that those elements of local office work which do not require face-to-face contact with the public should be moved out of some hard-pressed offices.

Mr. Sumberg: I acknowledge the tremendous work done by the officers at my DSS offices in Bury. Does my right hon. Friend agree on the need to improve the take-up of benefit by our constituents? Would not the hiving off of some services on an agency basis assist in meeting that objective?

Mr. Moore: The specific question refers to relocation, and I am waiting for the final Moodie report on whether an agency system would improve the service to the customer. Our prime concern must be how to ensure that the claimants, wherever they are in the kingdom, are looked after best. I am obviously delighted to look to an improvement in opportunities, especially for the hard-pressed regions, many of which might find the proposed changes of benefit to them.

Mr. Leighton: Will the Secretary of State admit that, as the amount of benefit paid out since April has diminished, his intention is to reduce the number of people employed in DSS offices? Is that not a mistake? Is this not a golden opportunity to keep those staff on to provide a better service and, in particular, to run a take-up campaign among those who are entitled to benefit but who are not claiming it?

Mr. Moore: The hon. Gentleman is right. Because of the reduction in unemployment, the simpler income support claimant forms and the way in which the whole system is being helped, there has been a considerable reduction in work in our offices. The hon. Gentleman was wrong not to realise that that is being used throughout the system—I have travelled extensively around the benefit offices to check on this—to improve delivery of service. Comparing income support with supplementary benefit, the national average clearance time for claims has fallen from over 11 days at the end of 1987 to five days in

September 1988, and I expect it to improve. The error rate has decreased. We are using the enhancement of the staff to improve our services, and staff are not being lost as a consequence.

Benefits

Mr. Thurnham: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what representations he has received about the level of social security benefits following the Chancellor of the Exchequer's Autumn Statement.

Mr. Scott: After the—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Mr. Beaumont-Dark) does not do badly in this place. I have to consider those hon. Members whose questions appear on the Order Paper.

Mr. Scott: After the expressions of opinion in this House, we have received a handful of letters from members of the public.

Mr. Thurnham: In view of the welcome continued falls in unemployment, will my hon. Friend say what effect that is likely to have on the total level of expenditure on benefits?

Mr. Scott: Throughout the public expenditure survey period we expect that there will be substantial reductions in the need to pay unemployment benefit because of the continued growth in the economy. We shall have to decide during the public expenditure survey round how our resources should be deployed.

Mr. Orme: What consultations did the Chancellor of the Exchequer have with his Department before his briefing a week ago last Friday to certain Lobby journalists?

Mr. Scott: It is fairly well known that we discuss all these matters during the course of the public expenditure survey each year. We did so last year, and we shall do so again next year.

Mr. Baldry: Would not a period of silence on pensions by the Opposition be worth while? The Labour party cheated pensioners out of nearly £1 billion—

Mr. Speaker: Order. As with questions to the Prime Minister, the hon. Member must ask questions for which the Secretary of State has responsibility.

Mr. Baldry: When my hon. Friend replies today to questions on this year's uprating in the Autumn Statement, will he take time to point out to the House and the country the contrast between the period 1974 to 1979 and today? The Labour Government failed to pay the Christmas bonus in 1976 and 1977. They cheated pensioners out of £1 billion by changing the basis on which pensions were uprated, and swindled pensioners out of massive amounts of savings by an economic policy that led to high inflation. Would not a period of silence by the Opposition on pensions now be worth while?

Mr. Scott: It would be worth while and much appreciated, but I fear that we are unlikely to get it, despite the fact that the Opposition know as well as we do that when they were in office pensioners' incomes increased by


about 3 per cent. over the whole period, whereas under this Government they have increased by some 23 per cent.—twice as fast as those of the population as a whole.

Mr. Dalyell: Further to the unanswered questions by my right hon. Friend the Member for Salford, East (Mr. Orme), was it on the Friday, the Saturday or the Sunday that DSS Ministers were first told and consulted about the Chancellor's briefing?

Mr. Scott: I have nothing to add to the reply that I gave to the right hon. Member for Salford, East (Mr. Orme).

Mr. Roger King: Is my hon. Friend aware of the widespread support for the Government's policy of targeting resources where they are most urgently needed, and especially of the great increase in family credit that his Department has just announced, so long as those additional sums of money go to those in need? Will my hon. Friend consider new initiatives—through the schools, for instance—to inform those families in need that the money is available?

Mr. Scott: We want to maximise the take-up of family credit in particular, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has already alluded to the steps that we shall be taking to achieve that aim. I know that my hon. Friend recognises—and I hope it is widely recognised—that had we uprated child benefit in this uprating the poorest families would not have been helped. The steps that we were able to take have targeted help on those on low incomes, whether they are on income support or in employment.

Mrs. Fyfe: What advice would the Minister give to one of my constituents, a 43-year-old widow who has been told that she must find either work or a husband? She lives in a constituency where the official unemployment level is 22·6 per cent.

Mr. Scott: If the hon. Lady will provide me with the details of the case, I shall look into it, but I do not recognise the circumstances that she mentions.

Mr. Yeo: Does my hon. Friend agree that the strength of the Government's finances, as reported to the House in the Autumn Statement, underlines the enormous scope for increasing benefits to the very elderly and the worst-off pensioners? We on this side of the House look forward eagerly to the Minister's Department revealing its proposals in due course.

Mr. Scott: I am sure that the House will have read my right hon. Friend's article in yesterday's Sunday Express with great interest.

Mr. Robin Cook: Does the Minister agree with the Chancellor of the Exchequer that his Back Benchers need to be educated about social security? Why should it be necessary to educate them about social security if all they ever think about is more help for pensioners?

Mr. Scott: I am afraid that I cannot comment on these apocryphal remarks that are attributed to my right hon. Friend.

Mr. David Shaw: Will my hon. Friend confirm that there has been a substantial real terms increase in social security expenditure since 1979? Will he comment on whether that increase is giving full value for money, or whether it would be possible to target benefits better?

Mr. Scott: There has been a substantial increase in real terms under the Government—some 40 per cent.—and an extra £3·4 billion is going in as a result of the uprating announced quite recently. That is the result of the strength of our economy. We shall continue to try to ensure that the most help goes to those most in need.

Child Benefit

Mr. Haynes: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will make it his policy to publish a long-term strategy for child benefit.

Mr. Moore: I shall continue to review the rate of child benefit each year in accordance with the duty that I have under the existing legislation.

Mr. Haynes: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that I was born in poverty 62 years ago? Is he also aware that there is still poverty in this nation? The Secretary of State ought to be ashamed of himself for backing a Government who have frozen child benefit when children need that benefit. He is robbing babies. I have looked into the right hon. Gentleman's background. He was all right when he was a child. He can take that grin off his face. I want to know what he will do for the children of today and the future. He has cut child benefit by £130 million. It is tune that he gave that money to the children.

Mr. Moore: I shall not go into details of personal background, but the hon. Gentleman might like to recheck the debates of 1975 and 1976. I shall not bore him again with details of the decisions made on this issue by Mrs. Castle and her colleagues. but I remind the hon. Gentleman that if anybody should be sitting uncomfortably in shame, it is the giggling Opposition Front Bench. They should recall that, for almost all the time that Labour was last in government, the value of the child tax allowance and the family allowance for families on average earnings was far below in real terms what it has been under this Government. [Interruption.] That is not very good information for the Opposition, but they have to hear it. Only once—during the months before the 1979 general election—did Labour increase child benefit to a level fit 10 be compared with what has been achieved by this Government.

Mr. Marlow: Will my right hon. Friend and the Government consider reintroducing that child tax allowance about which he was talking, thereby reducing taxation and public expenditure at a stroke? If not, why not?

Mr. Moore: My hon. Friend will be aware of what I said in my statement on the uprating about our manifesto commitment. We keep our manifesto commitments. My hon. Friend will also be aware of my duty under statute to consider the nature of child benefit and other aspects of the economy, such as increases in earnings and reductions in taxation, as have occurred this year. I did that this year and I shall try to do the same next year.

Mr. Nellist: If the Secretary of State were to undertake a long-term strategic study of child benefit, would he look at the effects over the long term of the freezing of other benefits such as the pensioners' Christmas bonus, which has been frozen since its inception—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must relate his question to child benefit.

Mr. Nellist: I have already done that. Is the Secretary of State aware that had the pensioners' Christmas bonus—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I called the hon. Gentleman because he has tabled question No. 25, which is on child benefit. I hope that he will stick to the subject of the question.

Mr. Nellist: Is the Secretary of State aware that had the pensioners' Christmas bonus been uprated by average earnings it should be more than £55 this Christmas?

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must ask a question relating to that on the Order Paper.

Mr. Nellist: Are we to see—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I have given the hon. Gentleman a good chance.

Mr. Nellist: Are we to see—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must sit down.

Mr. Nellist: You read it in Hansard and see whether it is in order.

Mr. Moore: I will never forget, and I am sure that the House will never forget, 1976 and 1975, when the issue not involved in the question was frozen for two years in a row.

Departmental Relocation

Mr. Cran: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what steps he has taken to implement the recommendations in his Department's report that a significant number of headquarters staff be relocated out of London.

Mr. Peter Lloyd: We accept in principle that there is a good case for relocating some of our headquarters work away from London. A team of officials are working on turning the principle into reality. We expect to have the team's report by the end of March 1989.

Mr. Cran: I congratulate my hon. Friend on his answer. I also congratulate him because his Department is in the forefront of relocating civil servants out of London and the south-east—a policy that is long overdue. Hard as I try, I cannot see Humberside mentioned in the document. Is he susceptible to representations to include it?

Mr. Lloyd: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for both of his congratulations. I know that he has a long-standing interest in the subject and that he is an excellent advocate for Humberside. I can assure him that if he puts to us the merits of Humberside as a suitable location for our out-of-town headquarters we shall consider them very carefully indeed.

Mr. Worthington: In considering the relocation of staff, will the Minister take into account the great difficulty that my constituents suffer in that whenever they send correspondence about disability to Norcross, or write to Blackpool about the self-employed family credit scheme, that mail seems to fall into a black hole and never emerge

again? Will the Minister consider substantially upgrading the staff and the resources in those areas so that the self-employed and the disabled can get a decent service?

Mr. Lloyd: That is not directly related to the question, but it is a very important matter. I do not accept the black hole analogy, but the service can be improved and is being improved by the operational strategy of introducing computerisation throughout the system so that at any particular office an individual will be able to get all the information he wants on any benefit that affects him.

Over-80s (Pension)

Mr. David Atkinson: To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is his current estimate of the number of people over 80 years who do not receive the full state retirement pension.

Mr. Peter Lloyd: About 66,000 people aged 80 and over do not receive full basic state pension—out of nearly 1·9 million in total. Those who do not receive full basic pension did not satisfy the contribution conditions.

Mr. Atkinson: Has my hon. Friend any estimates how much it would cost to provide those over-80s with a full basic pension? In view of their dwindling numbers, will he urge our right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to include that initiative in his forthcoming package of special help for poorer pensioners and to replace the 25p increase, which every 80-year-old must now regard as an insult on reaching that birthday?

Mr. Lloyd: I am afraid that I do not have the figure that my hon. Friend asked for, but, as he knows, those who do not receive the full pension and do not have sufficient income from other sources will have the difference more than made up through income support. We have no plans to discontinue the 25p age allowance, but I note my hon. Friend's enthusiasm for better targeting.

Mrs. Beckett: Does the Minister, whom I welcome to the Government Front Bench, recall reports to the effect that about 1 million pensioners who do not get a full state pension do not claim the income support to which they should be entitled? Does he not realise that that generation in particular is most reluctant to claim benefits which the Government persist in stigmatising as charity? If they are really making the oldest and poorest a priority, when will the Minister announce a massive take-up campaign for benefit along the same lines as the privatisation sales campaign?

Mr. Lloyd: The hon. Lady might be harking back in practice to the statements made by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State about a pension for pensioners on low income who have not benefited from occupational pension schemes or SERPS. The hon. Lady's objective is one that we share.

Mr. Hanley: Does my hon. Friend agree that those over 80 are increasing in absolute terms and as a proportion of the total population? Will he have urgent discussions with his colleagues at the Department of the Environment so as to allow local authorities greater leeway over spending for that age group in areas with a particularly high proportion of such people?

Mr. Lloyd: I shall draw my hon. Friend's comments to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment.

Oral Answers to Questions — ATTORNEY-GENERAL

"The Wilson Plot"

Mr. Winnick: To ask the Attorney-General if he plans to take any legal action regarding the book "The Wilson Plot", by Mr. D. Leigh.

The Solicitor-General (Sir Nicholas Lyell): I have no such plans at present.

Mr. Winnick: That is welcome. Is it not the case that much of the material in Mr. Leigh's book would be illegal if the Government's proposals to change the Official Secrets Act went ahead? Does the Solicitor-General not recognise that it is time the security services were subject to full parliamentary scrutiny, all the more so considering what Mr. Leigh has written about some of MI5's activities during the 1960s and 1970s?

The Solicitor-General: As the hon. Gentleman knows, those are matters for my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.

Mr. Aitken: Does my hon. and learned Friend realise that his answer about no activity concerning "The Wilson Plot" will disappoint milions of Big M's fans, because we need a sequel to "Carry on Spycatcher"? Surely my hon. and learned Friend recalls that at the end of that saga almost everyone was richer, the public were delighted and everyone was able to claim victory. Why should "The Wilson Plot" be denied that happy ending? Is M losing his touch? I think that we should be told?

The Solicitor-General: It is all very unfair.

Mr. Buchan: It must he especially disappointing for David Leigh. Has the hon. and learned Gentleman taken this decision because he has accepted the argument that the public interest must come first, or is it that he wishes to prevent the Government from making even bigger fools of themselves than they have in the past couple of years?

The Solicitor-General: There is no evidence in the book in question, as far as we have seen, of any breach of a duty of confidentiality, other than that of Mr. Wright.

Sunday Trading

Mr. Cran: To ask the Attorney-General what plans he has to publish the findings submitted to him by the Association of District Councils regarding the enforcement of Sunday trading laws; and if he will make a statement.

The Solicitor-General: I am placing in the Library a copy of the letter of 11 July 1988 from the Association of District Councils, which summarises the survey of enforcement undertaken by the association, together with the Attorney-General's letter requesting such information and his reply.

Mr. Cran: Does my hon. and learned Friend agree that whether the public can shop on a Sunday depends less on

the law than on geography? Does he agree that that is wholly unsatisfactory and that it is bringing the law alto disrepute?

The Solicitor-General: Section 71 of the Shops Act 1950 places a clear duty of enforcement and the discretion as to whether to exercise that duty in a proper case upon each local authority. No local authority has the right to abrogate that duty as a matter of principle.

Mr. Skinner: I wonder whether the Director of Public Prosecutions and his Department have discussed what they intend to do with Lady Porter and her friends on Westminster council—

Mr. Speaker: Order. We are on question 63.

Mr. Stanbrook: I welcome my hon. and learned Friend's answer about the duty of local authorities to prosecute. Will he deprecate the decision of those local authorities which say that, because of the referral of a certain case to the European Court, they do not intend to prosecute? Is it not undesirable that we have to wait upon a European institution before deciding to enforce our existing law?

The Solicitor-General: Referrals by the courts to the European Court by no means affect every case on Sunday trading, and local authorities should not, as a matter of course, regard them as any impediment to bringing prosecutions where they think it proper to do so.

Director of Public Prosecutions

Mr. Janner: To ask the Attorney-General when he last met the Director of Public Prosecutions; and what matters were discussed.

The Solicitor-General: On Thursday 10 November 1988. We discussed matters of departmental interest.

Mr. Janner: Will the hon. and learned Gentleman please consider using the Malicious Communications Act 1988 to prosecute the perpetrators of racist, anti-semitic and other evil publications sent through the post, such as Holocaust News? Will he also consider a filthy journal called "Choice", which is published by the Dowager Lady Birdwood? It reached my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Mr. Cummings) today and has been sent to other hon. Members. Does he think that the Dowager Lady Birdwood, whose wealth, influence and position lie behind much of the Fascist and Nazi organisations in this country, should be prosecuted under that Act?

The Solicitor-General: If the hon. and learned Gentleman will let me have a copy of the document in question, I shall have it looked at.

Mr. Hind: Given the problems of overcrowding in prisons, when my hon. and learned Friend has discussions with the Director of Public Prosecutions, will he consider the possibility of overturning the case of Turner—which was decided by the Court of Appeal—to allow counsel to plea-bargain in the judge's room to establish, for the benefit of an accused person, what the judge thinks the sentence will be should the accused plead guilty? In this way, the process of law throughout Crown courts will be speeded up and the number of people held on remand will be reduced.

The Solicitor-General: I shall discuss the matter with my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor.

Prosecution Policy

Mr. Campbell-Savours: To ask the Attorney-General when he next intends to meet the Director of Public Prosecutions to discuss prosecution policy.

The Solicitor-General: I expect to meet the director in just under three weeks' time.

Mr. Campbell-Savours: Did the Solicitor-General see the "Panorama" Wright interview, in which Wright said that he worked with one man during the period of the plot against the Wilson Government? Has he also noticed that, in his book, David Leigh indentifies that one man as Mr. Tony Brooks, who to this day lives in London and is a friend of an hon. Gentleman who was here a few minutes ago? Will that man be prosecuted? He lives in London and has been identified by Wright on television as working with him in illegal acts.

The Solicitor-General: I am interested in the information that the hon. Gentleman gives. I shall see that it is considered by the appropriate authorities.

Mr. Knapman: When my hon. and learned Friend next meets the Director of Public Prosecutions, will he consider operating a policy against Scottish Labour Members, who are rarely in the Chamber?

The Solicitor-General: As far as I know, that is not an offence.

Mr. Fraser: What other evidence has come to the Solicitor-General's attention that could corroborate the allegations made by Mr. Wright that have come to light since his book was published? Has there been much corroboration, and, if so, is it sufficient to re-open inquiries about whether criminal offences were committed?

The Solicitor-General: I cannot add to the answer that I gave to the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours).

National Security

Mr. Cryer: To ask the Attorney-General what is his policy towards the prosecution of former members of the security services for publication of confidential information.

The Solicitor-General: The policy is in accordance with the criteria set out in the code for Crown prosecutors.

Mr. Cryer: Does that mean that if former members of the secret police reveal that murder, conspiracy to sedition and other serious crimes have taken place attempts will be made by the Government to hush them up and sweep matters under the carpet, as they did with Peter Wright, or are they prepared to heap praise on members of the secret police who reveal that they have undertaken serious crimes—sometimes possibly without the knowledge of Ministers? Will he take action?

The Solicitor-General: I am not aware of any secret police. The answer to the other part of the question is no.

Mr. Lawrence: Is my hon. and learned Friend aware that the feeling of most people in this country is that those who betray the nation's secrets which are entrusted to them as part of their work, for money or notoriety, should be prosecuted, so as to end this sort of gross injustice?

The Solicitor-General: I well understand that and I am sympathetic to what my hon. and learned Friend has said. No one is above the law in this country, no matter what service he is in.

Mr. Bermingham: When he next meets the Director of Public Prosecutions to discuss the security services, will the hon. and learned Gentleman also take into account the considerable number of wire-tapping cases that are not being reported via the Home Secretary and which clearly show that the security services are exceeding their brief? Does the Solicitor-General intend that such cases will be revealed and prosecuted when necessary?

The Solicitor-General: I am not aware of those cases, but if the hon. Gentleman has evidence of them he should let the DPP know.

Oral Answers to Questions — OVERSEAS DEVELOPMENT

Japan

Mr. Nicholas Bennett: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has discussed overseas aid co-operation with representatives of the Government of Japan; and if he will make a statement.

The Minister for Overseas Development (Mr. Chris Patten): My Department is in frequent contact with representatives of the Government of Japan. I visited Tokyo in July and had wide-ranging discussions with the Japanese Government on overseas development issues.

Mr. Bennett: Is there any possibility of the Japanese Government giving financial assistance to British charities, such as the Save the Children Fund, which are working in developing countries?

Mr. Patten: That would be a sensible way in which the Japanese aid programme could develop in a number of countries. Our charities that work in long-term development are exceptionally professional, and I have suggested to the Japanese Government—this is a good idea of my hon. Friend's—that they might consider putting money through our non-governmental organisations, through a mechanism such as our joint funding scheme.

Mr. Skinner: Is not the truth that the Japanese are good at looking after themselves? Given their $80 billion trade surplus this year, is it any wonder that we read stories that they do not allow cosmetics into their country because they have different skins, or cannot allow skis to be imported because they have different snow, or have told Third world countries that they do not want their oranges because their stomachs are too small?

Mr. Patten: The hon. Gentleman's imaginative contribution to improving relations with Japan takes me well beyond my departmental brief. If he was trying to say that liberalising international trade is even more important than developing aid flows, I wholly agree with him.

Aid Distribution

Mr. Ian Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what are the United Kingdom's priorities for the geographical distribution of aid.

Mr. Chris Patten: In deciding how bilateral aid resources are allocated particular account is taken of need, how effectively our aid can be used, what other donors are doing and of the United Kingdom's historical links with many developing countries, particularly Commonwealth members.

Mr. Bruce: My hon. Friend will know that many of my constituents, especially in the Churches, are keen that we should give aid to Sudan because of the terrible problems there. What is happening about United Kingdom aid to Sudan, and what are we, as a country, doing to audit how well the money is spent when it gets to places such as Sudan and the rest of the world?

Mr. Patten: I know that a number of our Churches and other bodies are interested in our aid and development programme in Sudan. That is of particular concern to the diocese of Salisbury, which has its own contacts with Sudan. We shall be represented at the meeting next month with other donors to consider the World Bank's programme for rehabilitation after the floods. We, like other donors, will want to ensure that our money is well and effectively spent. It would, of course, be easier to promote the development of Sudan if a bloody civil conflict were not going on there.

Mr. Boateng: Has the Minister recognised the special needs of the Southern African Development Co-ordination Conference nations, and what steps are proposed to increase aid to those countries?

Mr. Patten: Recently we increased our commitment to the SADCC countries to £54 million. I shall be attending the SADCC meeting, God willing—

Mr. Tony Banks: What has the Prime Minister got to do with it?

Mr. Patten: —and hope to underline our commitment to SADCC and to the Limpopo line. I am delighted that the hon. Member for Newham North-West (Mr. Banks) has his priorities right.

Sir John Stanley: As many of the priority countries for British aid are those in sub-Saharan Africa, does my hon. Friend agree that it would be regrettable if the Government exercised only the option, under the Paris Club rescheduling, of making relatively modest reductions in interest rates on debts, rather than exercising the option of writing off some debt, as has been done by other countries? Would it not be regrettable if the excellent debt rescheduling initiative of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which was generous in concept, was less than generous in its implementation by the United Kingdom?

Mr. Patten: I sympathise with my right hon. Friend's argument. We have already written off about £1 billion worth of overseas aid loans and turned them into grants. The figure for sub-Saharan Africa is about £260 million. The Chancellor's initiative concentrated on three elements

—longer rescheduling, cutting interest rates and writing off aid loans—and we have been occupied across the board.

Nicaragua

Miss Lestor: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what further information he has about the extent of the destruction in Nicaragua following Hurricane Joan; and if he will make a statement.

Sir Russell Johnston: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations he has received from charities and other relevant bodies concerning the provision of aid to Nicaragua.

Mr. Chris Patten: As I informed the hon. Member for Glasgow, Provan (Mr. Wray) on 7 November, as a result of the hurricane 116 people were killed and 278 badly injured, 29,000 homes, 66 bridges, 24 roads and 300 schools were damaged or destroyed.
I have received a number of requests from British charities for financial help for the disaster relief operation in Nicaragua. The emergency assistance of £250,000 that I announced to the House on 24 October has been channelled through those organisations and the United Nations Disaster Relief Office. In addition, I have made available £135,000 for Costa Rica.
Including our contribution to European Community aid, our total assistance to those two countries stands at £481,000.

Miss Lestor: While thanking the hon. Gentleman for that reply, may I remind him that the destruction in Nicaragua of the coffee, cotton, banana and sugar cane crops, grazing land and animals, which he did not mention, has been colossal, and that more reports of damage are coming in? Whatever aid may have been made available, it is nothing like enough to help Nicaragua to get back on its feet. Will the Minister be flexible in response to specific demands? Will he give additional funds to projects that were previously joint funded by the Government, and that have been destroyed by the hurricane? I am thinking especially of the Rama Indians at Rama Keys—an OXFAM project co-funded by the Government which was completely wiped out. Will he also consider the provision of safe water in the Bluefields area?

Mr. Patten: We are certainly prepared to consider helping, through our joint funding scheme, non-governmental organisation projects that may have been damaged. If the charities apply to us in the usual way, we shall consider those suggestions as positively as possible.

Sir Russell Johnston: The Minister stressed the importance of taking into account need when giving aid. Leaving aside the hurricane, why is there such a difference between the aid given to Costa Rica, which was about £12·5 million in 1985, and that given to Nicaragua, which was £116,000? Should not the Government reappraise their approach to Nicaragua?

Mr. Patten: I do not think so. The main reasons for our aid programme to particular countries are developmental need, the poverty of the countries concerned and our historic connections. In Central America there are one or two other factors such as the presence in individual


countries of regional institutions, but I should point out, as I think I have before, that the European Community provided about £6 million last year to long-term development in Nicaragua, and we provided over £1 million of that.

Mr. Jacques Arnold: Will my right hon. Friend particularly concentrate assistance on the Bluefields area, which was not only the centre of damage resulting from the recent hurricane, but has had strong connections with this country for a long time? Will he also bear in mind that the damage that has been done to the Nicaraguan economy has a lot to do with the incompetent way that the Sandinista Government have run that country?

Mr. Patten: I take the point that politicians in some countries greatly favoured by Labour Members can do as much or more damage as natural calamities. I also take my hon. Friend's point about the importance of projects in Bluefields. I think he will know that we made a contribution to the Catholic bishop of Bluefields for emergency assistance.

Mr. Nellist: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: No. I will take points of order after the statement.

Mr. Nellist: It arises out of questions.

Mr. Speaker: Not now.

British Shipbuilders

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister of Trade and Industry (Mr. Tony Newton): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement on progress in returning British Shipbuilders to the private sector, in accordance with the policy described to the House by my predecessor on 18 April and 21 July. I felt that the House would rightly wish to have such a report before the forthcoming parliamentary break. I should, however, make it clear at the outset that I am not yet in a position to resolve all the remaining uncertainties.
When my predecessor made his statement in April, British Shipbuilders owned shipyards at Govan, Sunderland, Appledore and Port Glasgow, together with the Clark Kincaid marine engine builders on the Clyde and a services subsidiary, Marine Design Consultants, at Sunderland and Dundee. Together these accounted for some 6,500 employees—less than 20 per cent. of total United Kingdom employment in shipbuilding, which is of the order of 35,000.
The Govan shipyard was successfully sold in August to the Norwegian group Kvaerner Industrier. It has made a major inward investment in Govan, which is now to be the centre of its advanced gas ship technology. Kvaerner has so far placed orders for two gas-carrying ships at Govan with the possibility of similar orders to follow. The future of the yard now seems assured. Negotiations for the sale of Clark Kincaid to a management buy-out team have gone well. They have been materially helped by Kvaerner's confirmation, at the time of my visit to it, in Oslo two weeks ago, that the engines for the first two gas-carrying ships to he built at Govan would be built at Clark Kincaid. I am glad to say that all commercial matters have now been agreed. I hope that the sale will be successfully completed by the end of the year.
Negotiations have also been proceeding for the sale of the Appledore yard to Langham Industries. Langham hopes to place significant work with the yard, with continuing Government support under the intervention fund. The House will be pleased to know that Langham Industries and British Shipbuilders are now close to agreement. Again, I hope that this sale will be completed by the end of the year.
In the case of the Ferguson yard at Port Glasgow, I can also report further progress. British Shipbuilders has today named a preferred bidder. This is Ailsa Perth Ltd., which previously bought the Ailsa yard at Troon. Detailed negotiations will now get under way, and I have, of course, asked British Shipbuilders chairman, John Lister, to ensure that every effort is made to bring them to an early and satisfactory conclusion. I can also tell the House that bids have been received by British Shipbuilders for Marine Design Consultants. These are currently being evaluated by British Shipbuilders and its financial advisers.
The yards and other facilities to which I have so far referred account for nearly two thirds of those employed by British Shipbuilders at the start of this process. The other major element of British Shipbuilders is North East Shipbuilders Ltd. at Sunderland. This consists of building yards on either side of the Wear, at Pallion and Southwick, together with Sunderland Forge Services and a fitting-out yard at North Sands.
As the House knows, British Shipbuilders asked for bids for NESL by 30 September. Four bids were received. At a late stage in their evaluation during October, one of the bidders sought to modify his offer. As I told the House on 26 October, I therefore thought it right to allow a further short period for all those who had submitted bids to modify them if they wished before a final assessment was made. Subsequently, we have also given time for further talks related to the possibility of a Cuban order for cargo ships, and to seek clarification of a tentative indication of a new overseas interest.
I will deal first with the original bids, as modified. I have to tell the House that, following consideration by British Shipbuilders and its financial advisers, the chairman has told me, and I have accepted, that none of them is acceptable.
None of those bids had the combination of shipbuilding experience and solid financial backing which, in the Government's view, would be required to sustain a viable operation in the extremely difficult conditions of the world shipbuilding market. Each also raises specific difficulties. One of them was in practice not a detailed bid, and depended on the granting of a licence for dumping waste at sea which itself would take some considerable time to resolve. Another offered continuing employment for less than a tenth of the work force. The other two, which would themselves have entailed major redundancies, required a degree of subsidy which would have been highly unlikely to be permitted under the sixth directive. One of the last two was in fact last week withdrawn.
I can, however, tell the House that during the past few days British Shipbuilders has received three clear expressions of interest in a possible purchase of facilities at Sunderland, including the overseas concern to which I referred earlier. In these circumstances, I have agreed with the chairman of British Shipbuilders that an opportunity should be allowed to consider proposals from these interests. This will also enable those making them, if they wish, to be fully informed of the outcome of the talks which have been taking place between the Cuban shipping company Mambisa and its financial advisers in London, whose representative is due to return to this country tonight.
We want to establish, by the end of this month, whether proposals can be developed which give a firm basis for negotiation. That would entail a clear statement of the work envisaged for the yard, evidence of the technical and financial capacity of the bidder, and the prospect of arrangements likely to be compatible with the European Community sixth directive concerning state support for shipbuilding.
These are not easy criteria to satisfy, as we have seen in assessing the earlier bids. No one should underestimate the difficulties. Nevertheless, I am convinced that it is right to make this last effort to find a viable way forward for NESL on the basis that I have described, and I believe that the House will share that view.

Mr. Bryan Gould: Is the Minister aware that there will be great relief at this further stay of execution for NESL, but that there will be an equally heartfelt hope that he recognises at last that merchant shipbuilding matters too much to Wearside and the British economy to be sacrificed on the altar of privatisation? Will he join me in paying tribute to the "Save our shipyard"


campaign, the work force and the local community and its elected representatives who fought so hard to keep those yards open?
Will the Minister now say that his first priority is to secure the orders, especially the Cuban order, which will guarantee the future of these yards, and that this urgent and practical necessity will take priority over questions of ownership? In particular, will he guarantee that contracts will, if offered by the Cubans, be signed by North East Shipbuilders Ltd., irrespective of who is the owner for the time being?
Will the Minister concede that what matters to Sunderland and the British economy is to keep British merchant shipbuilding alive, and that the dogma of privatisation must now take second place? Will he recognise that we must now hope for more than the prolonging of a quite unnecessary agony of the Government's own creation and that he must now summon the courage to fight his corner with the EEC, to override his civil servants and to depart from the course mapped out by his predecessors and by the Secretary of State? Will the Minister now concentrate instead on building a viable future for shipbuilding on the Wear so that it can take advantage of the upturn in world demand for shipping and continue to make a vital contribution to our industrial future?

Mr. Newton: Far from the yards being sacrificed on the altar of privatisation, as the hon. Gentleman put it, the problem that we face is to rescue them from the disaster that nationalisation has been for them. It has led to British Shipbuilders costing the taxpayer overall about £2 billion since 1979, and on shipbuilding contracts alone it has lost £650 million, of which only £250 million has been within the permitted subsidy limits allowed by the agreed arrangements within the Community.
The hon. Gentleman referred to the possible Cuban order. No one should underestimate the difficulties of securing such an order against the intense competition that exists. However, in the circumstances that I described in my statement, in which further talks have been taking place in Cuba this week, I have felt it right to allow time for the outcome of those talks to be properly assessed. I cannot hold out hope, against the background of what I have already said about the losses made by British Shipbuilders, which include large losses made by North East Shipbuilders, of British Shipbuilders taking the contract, as the hon. Gentleman asked.
The hon. Gentleman also made remarks about my colleagues and my civil servants. In the past few weeks, I have given clear evidence to him and to the House that my purpose is to find a way of permitting the viable continuation of shipbuilding on Wearside, if that can be achieved. The hon. Gentleman should in turn recognise that the difficulties are great and that the optimism that has been expressed about an upturn in world shipbuilding orders, which I have read about, has to be judged against the fact that within the past few weeks the Association of West European Shipbuilders has drastically revised downwards its forecast of the upturn from annual orders of nearly 19 million compensated gross tonnes in the half decade from 1990 to 1995 to about 12·5 million compensated gross tonnes. What the hon. Gentleman has said needs to be judged against that.

Miss Emma Nicholson: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the constructive way in which the work force at Appledore has tackled privatisation and of its genuine gratitude to my right hon. Friend and the chairman of British Shipbuilders for the time they took to listen to the work force's views?

Mr. Newton: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her comments and also for the constructive part that she has played in developing the arrangements. As I said in my statement, I am now hopeful that they will lead to a secure future for her constituents who work at Appledore, about whom she is rightly concerned.

Mr. Ernie Ross: Does the Minister accept that there will be great fear in Scotland about whether the Ferguson yard will continue to operate? Will the Minister give assurances that the unions at Ferguson will have an opportunity to make an input into deciding on the preferred buyers? Will he also confirm that Marine Design Consultants of Dundee has put in a bid, and that it has been accepted? Will the Minister ensure that its bid is given an equal opportunity, against the voiced intention of the present managing director, who has made it clear that if he is allowed to buy both yards it is likely that he will want to close one of them?

Mr. Newton: British Shipbuilders today named a preferred bidder for Ferguson. It will be up to the preferred bidder to decide whether to hold talks with the work force and I expect that a preferred bidder would want to do that. We should not want to place any obstacle in the way.
The hon. Gentleman asked me about Marine Design Consultants. I cannot add to what I said in my statement. Bids have been received and are being evaluated, and it would be wrong of me to comment further until I have received advice from British Shipbuilders. When I have, I shall take account of the hon. Gentleman's point.

Mr. Barry Field: Can my right hon. Friend comment on the disputed ferry contract? Does he realise that his decision to limit the period to the end of the month will be widely accepted, not only by the work force but by the industry generally, as it will clear up the uncertainty hanging over the yard?

Mr. Newton: I thank my hon. Friend for the latter part of his remarks. The collapse of the Danish ferry order has been one of the factors that have aggravated NESL's problems in recent weeks. Of the original 24 ferries ordered, 15 are being built and nine are not. Two of the ferries have been delivered, 10 have been completed and three are yet to be finished. Some will require further modification. Negotiations are taking place in the wake of the cancellation of the contract but they have not yet been completed.

Mr. James Molyneaux: Having visited the north-east only two weeks ago, may I ask the Minister whether the implications of the EEC sixth directive and its effects on British Shipbuilders and Harland and Wolff were fully understood when the Government embarked upon the policy of privatisation?

Mr. Newton: I do not think that there has been any mystery in the industry about the general requirements and conditions of the sixth directive, under which intervention fund payments are made in appropriate


circumstances. On Harland and Wolff, the right hon. Gentleman will know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland is continuing discussions about the possibility of a sale.

Sir Peter Hordern: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that, if there is any question of the Cubans buying ships, British taxpayers' money will not be used as it was in the disastrous Polish shipbuilding order?

Mr. Newton: I can confirm that it is British taxpayers' money that meets any claims on the intervention fund, and, to that extent, taxpayers' involvement will continue. However, we have no intention of allowing the order to be taken in a form that would multiply still further the heavy losses of British Shipbuilders to which I referred in my statement.

Mr. Charles Kennedy: I welcome the fact that the Minister proposes to have another try at solving the problem. However, in view of the continued uncertainty at NESL, can the Minister say what he hopes will be the nature of his discussions and how he thinks they will overcome with the three new potential interests the problems that could not be overcome with the four previous ones?

Mr. Newton: I hope that what I have said and the tone of my statement suggest that I am anxious not to raise false hopes. As I said, the original bids were in no case acceptable; indeed, I judge that some of them were not terribly well put together. I hope that those who are now expressing an interest will have learnt some lessons from the previous experience, but I would not want to go beyond that.

Mr. Neville Trotter: Does my right hon. Friend accept that there has been great concern in Sunderland since the disastrous collapse of the ferry order earlier in the year? Does he also accept that there will be great relief that he is obviously genuinely trying to find a solution to a serious problem and an acceptable bidder to provide a sustainable future for the yard? Does he agree, however, that world prices are the basis of the problem in the industry, that a rise in prices of about 30 per cent. is needed, and that international action will be necessary if that is to come about?

Mr. Newton: I thank my hon. Friend for the earlier part of his remarks. The existence of the intervention fund, operating under the sixth directive, is directed at the problem to which he has referred. We have made it clear that intervention fund support would continue to be available on the terms current at the time in the event of the successful sale of the Sunderland yard.

Mr. Nicholas Brown: Can the Minister assure the House that merchant shipbuilding orders that are wholly within the gift of the Government will be committed to British yards and not committed abroad? What does the future hold for the headquarters of British Shipbuilders at Benton house, in my constituency?

Mr. Newton: I am not entirely sure what the hon. Gentleman means by the first part of his question.
Against the background of good progress towards the successful sale of most of the main remaining ingredients of British Shipbuilders—and our hopes and efforts in connection with the sale of the remainder—it will be

necessary in due course to arrange for an orderly rundown of the headquarters, although I cannot speculate about the timing of that.

Mr. Robin Maxwell-Hyslop: Could my right hon. Friend tell the House what is the position vis-a-vis him and the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, both of whom presumably have intervention funds at their disposal? If the sum of money is the same, who decides whether it goes to Harland and Wolff in Northern Ireland or to the north-east?

Mr. Newton: Both my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and I operate within the same general framework of policy on shipbuilding. Intervention fund support is not set in terms of a finite amount but depends on any particular proposal fulfilling the conditions and is then up, in shorthand terms, to 28 per cent. of the cost of the ship as things stand at present.

Mr. Bob Clay: I am genuinely grateful for the stay of execution which the Minister has given us once again. I know that he has been genuinely trying to find a solution to the problem within the context of the Government policy that he has inherited.
If the Minister must persist in privatisation rather than follow the logical course of allowing British Shipbuilders to take the Cuban contract and another which might be available, does he accept that the best way to achieve a workable solution by the end of the month in the time that he has given would be to follow these steps: first to ensure that there is generous Export Credits Guarantee Department or other cover on the Cuban order or any other that is available; secondly, to take an extremely robust attitude towards the European Commission and its interpretation of the situation—Commissioners in Brussels should not be able to close British shipyards, with the Government then saying simply that it is the European Commission's fault, not theirs. Thirdly, it would help a great deal if the very narrow guidelines given to British Shipbuilders on the cost of closure were widened so that the real cost of closure, as outlined in recent reports, was taken into account.

Mr. Newton: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his generosity in the first part of his remarks. I shall try to respond in the same spirit to his more specific questions.
We would consider any proposal made to ECGD in the same way that we consider any other proposal for help. In other words, if the proposal falls within the general parameters of policy, it would qualify. I can undertake to adopt a robust attitude with regard to the European Community, but it must also be a realistic attitude bearing in mind that all the relevant Governments have a common interest in not having a subsidy war between their shipbuilding undertakings.
With regard to the basis on which bids are judged, necessarily British Shipbuilders must consider bids in the light of its commercial interests. The advice that I have been given—and the view I have taken—also tries to take account of wider considerations in the way in which I am sure the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Clay) would wish.

Mr. Allan Stewart: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Clark Kincaid order from Kvaerner for engines for the gas-carrying ships not only underlines Kvaerner's commitment to the Clyde, but should give the


management buy-out at Clark Kincaid confidence for a successful future? Does he also agree that the announcement that Ailsa Perth is to be the preferred bidder for Fergusons should be welcomed because it will continue and maintain a long-standing and successful relationship between the two yards?

Mr. Newton: The answer to both parts of my hon. Friend's question is yes.

Mr. Chris Mullin: Is the Minister aware of any study by his Department or any other Department to assess the social and human costs of closure and to match those against the cost of keeping the yards open and going for the Cuban order?

Mr. Newton: In trying to reach conclusions on those matters, we tried to take account of all the issues involved. However, some of the figures that I have seen—for example, those in the lengthy paper published by the "Save our shipyard" campaign—seem questionable and we would have to look at them very closely.

Mr. Tim Smith: If British Shipbuilders has cost the taxpayer £2,000 million since it was nationalised, does not that underline what a disaster nationalisation has been? Will my right hon. Friend ensure that the interests of the taxpayer are fully considered in any arrangements that he is about to make?

Mr. Newton: The basis of our policy is to provide a future for merchant shipbuilding that strikes a better balance between the interests of the taxpayer and other considerations. We have made great progress towards securing that with the successful sale of Govan and the progress on other fronts that I have announced. If we can carry further that progress with NESL, no one will be more delighted than me.

Mr. Alex Salmond: What responsibility do the Government have or feel for continuing employment and capacity in the yards that have been privatised or are being privatised?

Mr. Newton: The Government's first priority has been to ensure that the yards, wherever possible, were placed in a position in which they could have a secure long-term future in shipbuilding. It is not possible for me to give absolute guarantees about the numbers employed, no more than it has been possible for BS to give such guarantees. During the time that BS has owned the yards there have been substantial reductions in employment in response to the inescapably difficult conditions in world shipbuilding.

Mr. James Cran: As BS has had trading losses of £1 billion and has received £250 million in intervention fund support since 1979, does my right hon. Friend agree that that public money could have been far better spent in generating economic development within areas such as Sunderland and elsewhere?

Mr. Newton: I think that there will be many who will share my hon. Friend's view.

Ms. Joyce Quin: As the British merchant shipbuilding industry has lost more jobs over the past decade than the shipbuilding industry in any other

EEC country, will the Minister agree that if Britain is to be a credible part of shipbuilding in Europe in future the NESL yards must stay open and the skills that are to be found within them used for the future?

Mr. Newton: I rather doubt whether the hon. Lady is entirely accurate in her opening statement, when she compared the position here with that in other countries in Europe. It is certain that all the shipbuilding centres in western Europe have experienced drastic and dramatic reductions in their shipbuilding work force in recent years. As I have said, that is an inescapable consequence of the difficult conditions in the world shipbuilding market.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: I appreciate the constraints that are placed upon my right hon. Friend by the sixth directive, but will he give an assurance to the workers in the north-east and on Clydeside that he will take urgent steps to ensure that other European countries, especially France, do not get round the directive because of the complications of their company structures? Despite the new-found enthusiasm of those who sit on the Opposition Front Bench and of the Scottish National party for the Community, can the Government give an assurance that there will be a fair deal for Scottish and English yards in Europe?

Mr. Newton: I can give my hon. Friend a clear guarantee that we shall remain supportive of efforts to ensure even-handed dealing throughout the Community with the shipbuilding industries of the member states, and thus a fair deal for British shipbuilders in that context. I think that everything that I have said this afternoon demonstrates our concern to do that.

Mr. Ted Garrett: Will the Minister accept that he is one of the few Ministers that I would consider having some interest in the principle of caring capitalism, which is the theme that is often adopted by the Conservative party? Will he accept also that those on the Tyne who have suffered grievous losses because of the decline in shipbuilding fully sympathise with those who are likely to lose their jobs in Sunderland? Will he stop harping on about the amount of money that is coming from the public purse? The amount of public money that will be used to keep shipbuilding jobs in Sunderland is peanuts when compared with the money that is spent on farming, for example. Will the right hon. Gentleman accept that it would be cheaper to keep the jobs of the men in Sunderland for a few more months, or even years, than pay them social security and unemployment benefit?

Mr. Newton: The point at issue was raised by one of my hon. Friends in a supplementary question a few moments ago. The question that everyone should ask is whether taxpayers' money on the scale that has been spent on British Shipbuilders since 1979 would not, with hindsight, have produced more secure jobs had it been applied in other ways.

Mr. Roger King: Is my right hon Friend aware that there are certain parallels between the position in which British Shipbuilders currently finds itself and the old British Leyland Motor Corporation—an unlamented state-owned organisation that owed billions of pounds? Privatisation, management buy-outs and partnerships with other businesses have turned subsidiaries such as Leyland Trucks into highly profitable


operations. Privatisation of British Shipbuilders in the way that my right hon. Friend has described must be the way forward.

Mr. Newton: We believe that it is the appropriate way forward, and we are encouraged by the experience at Govan and the prospects there about which I have spoken. I hope that my hon. Friend is right in the wider optimism that he expresses.

Mr. Robert Hughes: Leaving aside for the moment the ideology of privatisation, does not the Minister realise that experience has shown that privatisation is not a panacea for all evils and that selling off public enterprises to under-capitalised firms sows the seeds of its own disaster? Failure to give intervention fund support has also led to difficulties, such as in the case of Hall Russell shipbuilders in Aberdeen. Privatised two years ago, that company went into liquidation last Wednesday. Will the Minister give Hall Russell the support that it needs to complete its current order? Above all, will he make it clear to the people of Sunderland that privatisation is not the answer and that what is required is a commitment from the Government to keep jobs going—with less of the ideology, please?

Mr. Newton: The hon. Gentleman will know that the receiver is now at Hall Russell and he has expressed the hope that he will find a way of ensuring a continuing future for shipbuilding there and that the St. Helena ferry will be completed. I cannot say more at this stage.
The hon. Member is right when he says that there is no panacea, for such a thing does not exist either way. It is clear that nationalisation has not proved to be a panacea. It is my view, though not one with which the hon. Gentleman may agree, that the private sector ownership we have sought to bring about offers a better hope of a viable future for the yards.

Mr. Richard Page: The House is grateful to my right hon. Friend for literally bending over backwards to explore every option before making any decision about the future of the yards. Bearing in mind the catastrophic world situation, intense international competition and the limits of the sixth directive, can my right hon. Friend guarantee that support and an aid package will be available to the areas affected if, unfortunately and sadly, a yard has to close so that they may enjoy economic regeneration and hope for the future?

Mr. Newton: Yes, I can. Both my predecessor and I have made it clear that, in the event that we are forced to see the end of shipbuilding on the Wear, we would expect to announce measures for a remedial package for the development of a new industrial future for the town. There would be a good foundation on which to build, given what is already happening there, including the arrival of Nissan.

Ms. Hilary Armstrong: Does the right hon. Gentleman recognise that investment in other areas of the northern region when major industries have fallen, such as in my own constituency of Consett, has not led to a retention of the skill base? That will be a major problem if the shipbuilding industry in Sunderland is lost. Does the Minister further recognise that people in Sunderland fear that, because, along with people in the northern region, they have consistently voted against the Government—more so than in Scotland—closure will be

an ideological decision? Will the Government make a decision that will do more for the future of industrial and skill development in the town?

Mr. Newton: I will say as calmly as I can that I reject absolutely the hon. Lady's suggestion that Government policy is dictated by the north-east's political complexion. That is an extremely unhappy suggestion.

Mr. David Shaw: Can my right hon. Friend explain why the hon. Member for Dagenham (Mr. Gould) concentrated his remarks on the one third of British Shipbuilders—

Mr. Speaker: It will not be in order because the hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw) must ask questions concerning matters for which the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has responsibility.

Mr. Shaw: Will my right hon. Friend note that this debate has concentrated on points concerning the one third of British Shipbuilders that it has been difficult to sell? Does he agree that there should be statements of support for and best wishes expressed to the employees of the two thirds of British Shipbuilders who will be assured of a good future in the private sector? Is that not what Lech Walesa would do—look for the good news for the future and not for the bad news of the past?

Mr. Newton: Certainly there has been a remarkable absence of any reference to the successes to which my statement referred. However, I have been long enough in politics to know that it is not unusual for attention to be concentrated on the less satisfactory parts of an announcement of that kind.

Mr. Bob Cryer: To what degree has the attempt at privatisation produced uncertainty and therefore lost orders? Why does the Minister attack the concept of supporting shipbuilders in this country when other countries adopt such a policy—generating jobs not only in shipbuilding but also in steel making and in engineering in other parts of the country? Why is the Minister so rabidly opposed to providing support when this year, as in past years, the EC will spend more than £20 billion on farming? We should surely be prepared to support British manufacturing industry and our nation's assets and skills.

Mr. Newton: I do not accept that the policy we have adopted and are pursuing has had any deleterious effect on orders. The prospect that there will be more viable shipbuilding firms in this country is more likely to assist in obtaining orders than the reverse. On the hon. Gentleman's second point, we are not declining to give help. We are offering assistance within the terms agreed within the European Community, which is the sensible procedure.

Mr. David Wilshire: I congratulate my right hon. Friend on what has been achieved, and it is a tribute to his personal stickability that we have got this far. Does he agree that the concept of a nationalised British Shipbuilders in 1975 owed more to Socialist dogma than to practical common sense, and that that policy and party political involvement caused more problems than it solved?

Mr. Newton: Certainly no serious observer could suggest that nationalisation has answered these yards'


problems. I repeat that returning the yards to the private sector, with which we have already made good progress, will secure a much better future than they otherwise would have had.

Mr. Ian Bruce: Does my right hon. Friend agree that denationalisation of the yards is by far the best way of securing their future? It is essential for many reasons, not least for those of strategic defence, that there should be a shipbuilding industry in this country. What is my right hon. Friend's Department doing about confronting other nations which are unfairly trading in shipbuilding by giving excessive subsidies? What can we look forward to by way of the Government protecting a private shipbuilding industry from unfair competition?

Mr. Newton: My hon. Friend's latter questions return us to the sixth directive and to the Community's general collective aim of ensuring a reasonable basis on which European shipbuilding can continue. We shall continue to play our part in that.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: Is this not the same Government who allocate £13 a week out of the taxpayers in every family in Britain to the Common Market to provide subsidies? Is it not the same Government who handed over £400 million to British Aerospace before it was privatised—another fat subsidy? Is this not the same Government who handed over £4·5 billion when they transferred Rover? Is this not the same Government who gave a licence to Barlow Clowes, but who cannot give a licence to—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member is himself a chairman and must know that he should stick to the question and not go wide of it.

Mr. Skinner: My question is about subsidies—this place is subsidised as well. The Government will be symbolised by the picture of the Prime Minister in Gdansk, trying to save a shipyard there and shutting shipyards in the north-east. The Government are prepared to hand out subsidies to their friends but are not prepared to look after working people.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member must not debate the matter.

Mr. Newton: It is the same Government who, like successive Governments, have carried through a policy of privatisation, covering about 40 per cent. of what was the nationalised sector, which is widely copied throughout the world and has produced a massive expansion in share ownership.

NEW MEMBER

The following Member made the Affirmation required by law:

James Sillars Esq., for Glasgow, Govan.

Means-Tested Benefits

Mr. Gordon Brown: I beg to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 20, for the purpose of discussing a matter that is specific and important and requires urgent consideration, namely,
new evidence relating to the Government's intentions for means-tested benefits.
The matter is specific because of the unanimity yesterday in the journalistic record of the Chancellor's briefing last Friday, the independent corroboration of that record in—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. An application is being made to me, but I cannot hear because of the shouting from the Government Benches.

Mr. Brown: The matter is specific because, as a result of the unanimity in the journalists' record of the Chancellor's briefing last Friday and the independent corroboration of that record in a second Treasury briefing last Saturday, the Chancellor now has a clear duty to answer the specific and precise questions that have been put to him about his real intentions for the future of the welfare state and to explain in particular his assertion that only "a tiny minority" of pensioners have
difficulty in making ends meet";
his statement that there is
clearly a case for restructuring child benefit";
and his view that for millions of pensioners targeting, and therefore means testing, is
the way that the Government are likely to go".
He has a clear duty to explain why, if his sole aim was to provide more cash for poorer pensioners, he accepted that this would require the education of his Back Benchers and why he suggested that journalists should examine a list of unpledged benefits, benefits that the Government clearly considered themselves free to means-test.
The matter is specific also because, since last Monday's failure to provide detailed answers and last Tuesday's appearance of a transcript, the Chancellor has refused to give full answers to detailed questions. He has run away from facing a debate in the House and has declined to answer the point-by-point rebuttals of his own statement that came from journalists in yesterday's press.
The matter is important because, by his refusal to answer, by his inability to provide a tape or a transcript of his statement or give a satisfactory explanation for the absence of that tape and by his refusal to allow voice enhancement techniques to be applied to that tape, the Chancellor has done nothing to allay the fears of mothers, families and especially pensioners that the Government's real objective is to move from a regime of universal benefits to a regime of universal means testing, so jeopardising for millions of pensioners security in ill-health and dignity in old age.
The matter requires urgent consideration not only because this is the last full day of the parliamentary Session, not only because the journalists have unanimously rejected the Chancellor's explanations as a travesty of the truth, but because of the highly suspicious range of denials, delays and prevarications which we have heard over seven days which simply seek to protect the Chancellor from the proper scrutiny of the House and the general public.
The issue is not the reliability of a Treasury tape recorder; it is the trust that millions of people have put in the welfare state and around which they have organised their lifetime finances—a trust which the Chancellor seems intent on betraying. What this country requires is not a partisan defence outside this place of the Chancellor's general record. What the House requires are straight answers to straight questions.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member asks leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that he believes should have urgent consideration, namely,
new evidence relating to the Government's intentions for means-tested benefits.
I have listened with care to the hon. Member. As he knows, my sole duty in considering an application under Standing Order No. 20 is to decide whether it should be given priority over the business set down for this evening or tomorrow. I regret that I cannot find that the matter that he has raised meets the criteria laid down under Standing Orders. I cannot, therefore, submit his application to the House.

Ulster Hospital, Belfast

Rev. Ian Paisley: I beg to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 20, for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely,
the closing of 29·5 per cent. of all acute beds in the Ulster hospital, Dundonald, Belfast, which includes a third of the total number of plastic surgery beds and a half of the gynaecological beds.
Coming on top of the closing of many hospitals in Northern Ireland and of many beds in the Royal Victoria hospital and the Musgrave Park hospital, and coming on top of the row about the unfair grading of nurses, the announcement which was made at the weekend has been a body blow to the people of Northern Ireland.
Plastic surgery is an important part of hospitalisation in Northern Ireland because of terrorist activity and the need for the victims of terrorist activity to have that facility available. One third of the total number of plastic surgery beds are to be closed. Surely the Government should preserve, and not guillotine, this type of service.
The matter is urgent because there is no other forum in Northern Ireland where we can democratically discuss this matter, because the boards in Northern Ireland responsible for the administration of hospitals are nominated boards, with the Ministers' placemen the majority on them. I press you, Sir, to give the House an opportunity to discuss this matter.

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member asks leave to move the Adjournment of the House for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that he believes should have urgent consideration, namely,
the closing of 29·5 per cent. of the acute beds in the Ulster hospital, Belfast, which includes a third of the plastic surgery beds and 50 per cent. of the gynaecological beds in the entire hospital.
I have listened to the hon. Member with great care, but I regret that I must give him the same answer that I gave the hon. Member for Dunfermline, East (Mr. Brown). I cannot see that the hon. Member's application meets the criteria of Standing Order No. 20, and therefore cannot submit his application to the House.

Points of Order

Mr. Dave Nellist: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You will remember that in question No. 8 my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Mr. Haynes) asked the Secretary of State for Social Security to publish a long term strategy for child benefit. As Hansard will show tomorrow morning, in a supplementary question I began with the following words: "If the Secretary of State were to undertake a long-term strategic study of child benefit, would he look at the effects over the long term of the freezing of other benefits, such as the pensioners' Christmas bonus which has been frozen since its inception?" Is it not in order to compare two benefits, exactly in the same way as you allowed the hon. Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. King), during questions on the statement, to compare British Leyland's state subsidy and to make allegations about British Steel's state subsidy, particularly since £5 billion has been lost since 1979 by not uprating the pensioners' Christmas bonus? As Nye Bevan would have said, "Why look in the crystal ball when you can read the book?"

Mr. Speaker: If the hon. Gentleman studies Hansard carefully tomorrow morning I think he will see that on no fewer than two occasions I tried to get him back to the question of child benefit. Although Ministers do not link questions with others that appear further down the Order Paper, I always try to do so. If the hon. Gentleman looks carefully at the Order Paper, he will see that his question No. 25 relates to child benefit allowance. He asks the Secretary of State for Social Security
what would be the value, in 1988 prices, of the child benefit allowance, had it since its inception been increased annually by the equivalent of the rise in the value of: (a) the retail price index, and (b) average earnings.
That would have been a very good question to ask.

Mr. Jeremy Hanley: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. The hon. Member for Dunfermline, East (Mr. Brown), in his application under Standing Order No. 20, referred to the fact that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer is reported to have said that his Back Benchers need to be educated. It is clear from the reports that have been published since then that my right hon. Friend said no such thing and that in fact he was answering a question from a journalist who had made that statement. Is it not—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I have already said that I cannot allow an application under Standing Order No. 20 on the subject. What journalists say is not a matter for me.

Mrs. Alice Mahon: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. On question No. 5, the Secretary of State for Social Security said in answer to a question from me that the elderly are a burden to others. That was very hurtful and dehumanising. I ask that in future—

Mr. Speaker: Order. We cannot have a re-run of Question Time.

Mr. Nigel Spearing: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Are you able to guide the House about Standing Order No. 20 applications in general? I ask you to reflect on a particular matter. Most Standing Order No. 20 applications relate to the actions of Ministers when

exercising their ministerial responsibilities. However, when there is a Standing Order No. 20 application that relates to action that has already been taken by a Minister the probability of that action being raised in debate at a future date is quite distinct from a request that the Minister should take action in the future. Could you reflect on the fact that the longer the period from the time when the Minister took that action to the time when a debate may take place on a future occasion may affect the efficacy of the debate and the ability of the House to deal with a matter that is retrospective rather than prospective?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Gentleman knows that the criteria for Standing Order No. 20 applications are that the matter must be urgent, specific and important. Standing Order No. 20 applications must be raised at the first opportunity and notice must be given to me, whenever possible, before 12 o'clock. I have to make difficult decisions as to whether those applications meet the criteria. I did not find that to be so in today's cases.

Mr. David Winnick: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I believe that you accept that one of the Opposition's duties is to scrutinise the activities of Ministers. The Session is coming to an end. We on this side of the House believe that much has to be done to explain the discrepancy between what the journalists wrote yesterday and what the Chancellor said—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is trying to perpetuate the Standing Order No. 20 application that was made by his hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline, East (Mr. Brown).

Mr. Tam Dalyell: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, arising from question No. 7. A factual question was asked about when Ministers first knew of the Chancellor's briefing. We have to accept that what journalists say is not a matter for you, but it is a matter for you when the House finds difficulty in establishing factually what happened. In the politest way, I asked whether it was on the Friday, Saturday or Sunday that Department of Social Security Ministers—

Mr. Speaker: Order. It is no good raising that matter with me as a point of order, because I could not possibly know the answer to it.

Mrs. Ann Clwyd: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I put it to you as the defender of Parliament's rights that this is an issue of great importance to the House of Commons. The Chancellor has not come clean. It is your duty to defend our rights. If he—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Lady will know that I take that as a prime charge. I do defend the rights of the House of Commons. There was a private notice question last week on this very matter, which I granted.

Mr. Dennis Skinner: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You said earlier that matters have to be raised as soon as possible after they have occurred. I see your point, as does the House. Do you accept that during Question Time, at which both of us were present, there was an altercation between members of the Opposition Front Bench and Treasury Ministers on whether Department of Social Security Ministers knew about the Chancellor's intervention? You will have noticed that various Ministers refused to answer that question; they blocked it


successfully and did not answer. This is the first available opportunity that any Opposition Member has had to make a Standing Order No. 20 application. It was only at that point that a question about the matter had been asked in the House, notwithstanding what—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is very helpful, as I would expect him to be because of his position in the House, but he must know that whoever occupies this Chair must have regard to all sorts of considerations, in particular the criteria laid down in the Standing Order. I cannot he held responsible for what Ministers say at the Dispatch Box. That is not a matter for me.

Mr. Robert N. Wareing: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Do you not agree that on some occasions when you rule that a Standing Order No. 20 application is not a matter of urgent debate it may become so later? For example, the Chancellor's meeting with the press could become the subject of further debate while Parliament stands prorogued. If that happened but Parliament had been unable to debate what the Chancellor said, would it not mean that far from Parliament being the forum of the nation the press would become that forum? If the press were to continue to debate this matter during Prorogation, would you be prepared to review the case for an urgent debate?

Mr. Speaker: I take every case on its merits. What the hon. Gentleman is saying is at the moment hypothetical.

Mr. Bob Cryer: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I wonder whether you, as Chairman of the House of Commons Commission, will look during Prorogation into the matter of a private body that runs a magazine which purports to represent the views of the House of Commons. It has carried the portcullis for a period without official authority. When the League Against Cruel Sports produced a portfolio, I recall that it was rapidly told to drop the portcullis.
This private magazine is not accountable to the House. We cannot ask questions about how much profit is being made. We cannot ask whether its pages are being abused by being opened to the Tory leader of Bradford council to justify his swingeing cuts. These are important matters. If the magazine were accountable to the House, a judgment could be made about it, but it is being run by an all-party clique of hon. Members. They can do what they want. They are not accountable. The magazine should not be described as having connections with the House. It is a private magazine with a small circulation, but it uses the imprimatur of the House of Commons. There should be some element of accountability, but it is noticeably absent. I hope that you, Mr. Speaker, will look into the matter during Prorogation.

Mr. Speaker: Order. This matter has been raised before. I think that it was discussed by the House of Commons (Services) Committee. If the hon. Gentleman wants to make further points, his right course is to draw them to the attention of the Services Committee.

Mr. Dalyell: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: Is it a different point of order?

Mr. Dalyell: Yes. Mr. Speaker Hylton-Foster, who was my first Speaker, used from time to time to appeal to the good will of the Leader of the House in difficult situations such as we have with the Chancellor. Can we reinstate the concept of the good will of the Leader of the House? He might vouchsafe some kind of statement on this matter which obviously concerns serious hon. Members on both sides of the House.

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the House is here. I know that he is a man of good will. I am sure that he will have heard what has been said.

Orders of the Day — Road Traffic (Consequential Provisions) Bill [Lords]

Considered in Committee

[MR. HAROLD WALKER in the Chair]

Clauses 1 to 7 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 8

SHORT TITLE, COMMENCEMENT AND EXTENT

The Solicitor-General (Sir Nicholas Lyell): I beg to move amendment No. 1, in page 2, line 38, leave out 'three' and insert 'six'.
The amendments that stand in my name were shown in draft to the Chairman of the Joint Committee on Consolidation, &c., Bills, who said that they were, in his opinion, proper to be moved as part of the consolidation effected by the Bills.
Amendment No. 1 relates to the provision for the commencement of the Bill three months after Royal Assent. Representations from the Justices Clerks Society suggested that that would not give magistrates courts sufficient time to adjust to the change, so the amendment extends the period to six months.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 8, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 1

REPEALS AND REVOCATIONS

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 2, in page 7, leave out lines 24 to 28.

The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to consider Government amendment No. 3.

The Solicitor-General: The references in the Bill to the Criminal Justice Act 1988 are to the text of the Bill for that Act as amended by Standing Committee in the Commons. There were changes in clause and schedule numbers before the Criminal Justice Act received Royal Assent, and the amendments bring the references in the Bill up to date.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made: No. 3, in page 7, line 31, at end insert—

"1988 c. 33.
Criminal 1988.
Justice
Act
Section 37(2) Section 63. Section 68.






In Schedule 15, paragraphs 92 to 94.'






—[The Solicitor-General.]

Schedule 1, as amended, agreed to.

Schedule 2 agreed to.

Schedule 3

CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS

Amendments made: No. 4, in page 27, line 36, leave out paragraph 38.

No. 5, in page 27, line 44, at end insert—

'The Criminal Justice Act 1988 (c. 33)

39. In section 40 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, in subsection 3(c) for "section 99(b) of the Road Traffic Act 1972" there is substituted "section 103(1)(b) of the Road Traffic Act 1988".'.—[The Solicitor-General.]

Schedule 3, as amended, agreed to.

Schedule 4 agreed to.

Schedule 5

TRANSITORY MODIFICATIONS

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 6, in page 30, line 21, leave out paragraph 1.

The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to take Government amendment No. 7.

The Solicitor-General: Paragraph 1 of schedule 5 contains transitory modifications of the Road Traffic Bill and the Road Traffic Offenders Bill pending the coming into force of various sections of the Criminal Justice Act 1988. These provisions are now all in force, or will be in force before this consolidation can come into force, so the transitory modifications are no longer necessary.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendment made: No. 7, in page 31, line 9, leave out paragraph 3.—[The Solicitor-General.]

Schedule 5, as amended, agreed to.

Bill reported, with amendments; considered, read the Third time, and passed, with amendments.

Road Traffic Bill [Lords]

Considered in Committee.

[MR. HAROLD WALKER in the Chair.]

Clauses 1 to 107 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 108

INTERPRETATION

The Solicitor-General (Sir Nicholas Lyell): I beg to move amendment No. 1, in page 74, leave out lines 6 to 8.
Part III of the Bill derives from part III of the Road Traffic Act 1972. Part III of the Bill does not deal with disqualification and endorsement of licences on conviction, unlike part III of the 1972 Act. The provisions about disqualification and endorsement are now to be found in part II of the Road Traffic Offenders Bill. Accordingly, part III of the Road Traffic Bill does not require definitions of, "offence involving obligatory disqualification" and "offence involving discretionary disqualification" and the amendment omits those definitions.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 108, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 109 to 144 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 145

REQUIREMENTS IN RESPECT OF POLICIES OF INSURANCE

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 2, in page 99, line 1, leave out subsection (7).
Paragraph 3 of schedule 5 to the Road Traffic (Consequential Provisions) Bill contains transitory modifications. These and other amendments and modifications remove transitory modifications which are no longer necessary.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 145, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 146 to 150 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 151

DUTY OF INSURERS OR PERSONS GIVING SECURITY TO SATISFY JUDGMENT AGAINST PERSONS INSURED OR SECURED AGAINST THIRD-PARTY RISKS

Amendment made: No. 3, in page 104, line 14, leave out subsection (11).—[The Solicitor-General.]

Clause 151, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 152 to 160 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 161

INTERPRETATION

Amendment made: No. 4, in page 110, line 32, leave out subsection (4).—[The Solicitor-General.]

Clause 161, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 162 to 196 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 197

SHORT TITLE, COMMENCEMENT AND EXTENT

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 5, in page 131, line 4, leave out 'three' and insert 'six'.
This clause provides for the commencement of the Bill three months after Royal Assent. Again, representations from the Justices Clerks Society suggest that that would not give sufficient time for magistrates courts to adjust to the change. The amendment extends the period to six months.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 197, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 1 agreed to.

Schedule 2

DEFERRED TESTS OF CONDITION OF VEHICLES

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 6, in page 135, line 26, leave out
'subsection (6) of that section'
and insert
'section 67(6) of this Act'.
The amendment corrects an error in a cross-reference

Amendment agreed to.

Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.

Schedules 3 and 4 agreed to.

Bill reported, with amendments; considered, read the Third time, and passed, with amendments.

Road Traffic Offenders Bill [Lords]

Considered in Committee.

[MR. HAROLD WALKER in the Chair]

Clauses 1 to 8 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 9

MODE OF TRIAL

The Solicitor-General (Sir Nicholas Lyell): I beg to move amendment No. 1, in page 5, line 15, leave out subsection (2).
Paragraph I of schedule 5 to the Road Traffic (Consequential Provisions) Bill contained transitory modifications of the consolidation pending the coming into force of certain provisions of the Criminal Justice Act 1988. These provisions are now all in force, and the Committee has approved an amendment to omit paragraph 1 of schedule 5. Subsection (2) warns the reader of the existence of the modification, and is no longer necessary.
There is the same explanation for amendments Nos. 8, 9 and 11 in relation to clauses 54, 89 and schedule 1, respectively.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 9, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 10 to 18 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 19

EVIDENCE OF DISQUALIFICATION IN SCOTLAND

Amendment made: No. 2 in page 11, line 5, after 'proceedings', insert 'in Scotland'.—[The Solicitor-General.]

Clause 19, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 20 to 53 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 54

NOTICES ON-THE-SPOT OR AT A POLICE STATION

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 3, in page 27, line 39, leave out 'an' and insert 'a constable or'.
Subsections (4) and (5) derive from section 28(1) and (2) of the Transport Act 1982, which provides for a person who has committed a fixed penalty offence to produce his licence to a constable at a police station in order to obtain a fixed penalty notice. The Criminal Justice Act 1988 extended this provision so that the licence might be produced to an authorised person, that is, a person authorised by the chief officer of police. In the clause the references to a constable have not been reproduced, and amendments 3 to 7 rectify that omission.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendments made: No. 4, in page 28, line 2, leave out 'an' and insert 'a constable or'.

No. 5, in line 6, after first 'the', insert 'constable or'.

No. 6, in line 9, after 'the', insert 'constable or'.

No. 7, in line 11, after 'the', insert 'constable or'.

No. 8, leave out lines 25 and 26.—[The Solicitor-General.]

Clause 54, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 55 to 88 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 89

INTERPRETATION

Amendment made: No. 9, in page 51, line 29, leave out subsection (3)—[The Solicitor-General.]

Clause 89, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 90 to 98 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 99

SHORT TITLE, COMMENCEMENT AND EXTENT

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 10, in page 55, line 17, leave out 'three' and insert 'six'.
The amendment extends the period before commencement from three to six months.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 99, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 1

OFFENCES TO WHICH SECTIONS I, 6, II AND 12(I) APPLY

Amendment made: No. 11, in page 56, line 24, leave out paragraph 5.—[The Solicitor-General.]

Schedule 1, as amended, agreed to.

Schedule 2

PROSECUTION AND PUNISHMENT OF OFFENCES

The Solicitor-General: I beg to move amendment No. 12, in page 69, line 5, column 7, leave out '2–5' and insert '3–9'.

The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to take Government amendments Nos. 13 and 14.

The Solicitor-General: The amendments give effect to the Penalty Points (Alteration) Order 1988, which was made under section 19(8) of the Transport Act 1981 on 2 November 1988, and is to come into force on 1 March 1989.

Amendment agreed to.

Amendments made: No. 13, in page 91, line 12, column 7, leave out '4–8' and insert '6–8'.

No. 14, in page 93, column 7, leave out lines 11 to 15 and insert '8–10'.

Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.

Schedules 3 to 5 agreed to.

Bill reported, with amendments; considered, read the Third time, and passed, with amendments.

Health and Safety

Mr. William Cash: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I wish to raise a matter arising from a document produced by the European Commission entitled, "Developing an active company approach to the European Market—Europe in 1992." I have already raised this matter with Mr. Speaker through the Clerk of the House.
The Government and the whole House are familiar with the whole question of 1992, and are generally supportive. However, a very important question of order arises in relation to this particular document published by the European Commission. The document contains advice which suggests that no regard is being taken of the role of this Parliament in the making, scrutinising and passing of legislation affecting people in this country. Fifty thousand copies of that document have been distributed by the European Commission. It appears from page 23 of the document that the United Kingdom Parliament has no role in the passage of such legislation—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harold Walker): Order. The hon. Gentleman said that he has drawn the matter to the attention of the Clerk and of Mr. Speaker. I understand his point and I am well aware of his concern, but this is not a matter for the Chair. The only advice that I can offer the hon. Gentleman is that he should seek the services and offices of his own Member of the European Parliament.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Everyone knows that the Common Market does not oblige the Council of Ministers to pay the slightest attention to the House of Commons. Anyone who voted for the treaty of Rome and for the Single European Act knows that. Surely they also accept that the European Parliament can express views which can he completely ignored by the Council of Ministers. I hope that before we start a long debate on important vital constitutional issues, we will not be misled by the view that the House of Commons influences the Council of Ministers or that the views of the so-called European Parliament have any effect whatsoever. Surely we should be clear about the constitutional points before we go one step further.

Mr. Cash: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. My point is less in regard to the European Parliament, for which many of us have a great deal of respect. "Erskine May", chapter 34, clearly states that many aspects of draft Community legislation require implementation in this House. It is wholly inappropriate for the European Commission to publish a document on this scale, filtering through the whole of the United Kingdom, from which it appears that there is no role for the United Kingdom Parliament in the passage of this legislation. Therefore, I wish to register a protest on behalf of my constituents, and the electorate as a whole, at the way in which this document has been promulgated.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I hope that you will make things clear. On Thursday night we had a perfect example of the point that I am making. For an hour and a half we debated an order on origin marking. It was a long debate but it was made clear by Ministers that it would make no difference

whether we voted for or against the order as there had not been a prosecution for two years because of a decision by the EEC. Surely we accept—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is making the point that I made earlier. These are not matters for the Chair. That is the position.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I do not wish to detain the House, but, although tiny, this is an important point. I hope that before hon. Members begin a long debate they will appreciate that, once an EEC decision has been made, it is effectively the law of the land, whether Parliament approves or not. There are ample test cases to prove that.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Those are matters for debate, not for the Chair.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Surely the document, "Europe in 1992", brings the House into contempt when the Commission, which has not been elected, makes it clear that the House has no role in controlling affairs at the heart of our way of life. Surely it is a matter that the Chair has to take into consideration. I am a Member of the European Parliament and I know that Members of that Parliament are helpless in matters such as this. We need the help of the House and of you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, in a matter of such gravity.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: I hope that hon. Members will not seek to draw the Chair into matters of political controversy. These are matters that the House has debated and, doubtless, will debate again in the future. The points that have been raised are appropriate matters for debate, rather than for a ruling from the Chair.

The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. John Cope): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 5211/88 on the safety and health of workers at the workplace and 5762/88 and the Supplementary Explanatory Memorandum submitted by the Department of Trade and Industry on 7th July 1988 on personal protective equipment; supports the proposals in principle as steps towards the establishment of comparable high standards of health and safety throughout the Community and the removal of technical barriers to trade; and endorses the Government's endeavours to secure modifications in negotiations.
The Government believe that the House has a role to play because it influences the stand taken by the Government and Ministers in the Council of Ministers. That is the purpose of the debate. In fact, it has a greater role than that, which I shall seek to show.
The European Commission proposals are part of the move towards completing the single European market by 1992—a move to which the United Kingdom and the rest of the European Community are committed. The steadily increasing European Community activity in health and safety at work reflects the impetus that moves towards economic integration have given to a whole range of other European developments. Those moves have been given clearer direction and purpose since 1985 when the European Community decided to undertake a full programme of activity to complete the single market. Part of that programme stems from a recognition that it is


important that competition is not distorted by differences in basic health and safety standards with which employers in member states are required to comply.
There are differences in standards and of approach between member states, and no doubt there are lessons that we can learn from each other. As regards fatal accidents, only the Netherlands has a better record than the United Kingdom. Rates among leading competitors are significantly worse. We must not be complacent and the figures tell only part of the story. However, they show that the United Kingdom already has fairly high standards. That must not put us at a disadvantage to our competitors: the objective must be to bring them up to our standards, not the other way round.
The proposed directives are based on provisions in the Single European Act which, as the House will be aware, introduced a number of reforms to the treaty of Rome. The Act was intended to improve the workings of the Community, to extend its scope in areas such as this and to speed up progress towards agreed objectives. For example, the Act enables the Council of Ministers to take decisions on many issues by a system of qualified majority voting. The removal of the effective power of veto is aimed at speeding up the European law-making process on matters such as health and safety at work and product standards. It makes it more important than ever for the United Kingdom to win the support of other member states through reason and argument and also for us to be sufficiently flexible to accept reasonable compromise when necessary.

Mr. Bob Cryer: Is the Minister saying that if we want to retain the absolute provisions of section 14 of the Factories Act 1961 regarding dangerous machinery, but, for example, Spain proposes that standards should be lowered, we will not be able to protect those provisions?

Mr. Cope: I cannot recall the precise provisions of that section, but the European proposals are for minimum standards. We are free to have higher standards if we wish.
The workplace proposals introduced earlier this year—they are covered by the first of the explanatory memoranda referred to in document 5211/88—consist of a framework directive specifying measures to encourage improvements in the safety and health of workers and five subsidiary, or daughter, directives. Those subsidiary directives set the minimum—I stress "minimum"—requirements for workplaces on the use of machines, personal protective equipment, visual display units and the handling of heavy loads which are likely to cause back injury.
The new treaty provisions on which the proposals are founded—article 118A—for the first time, provide for Community measures on health and safety at work. That reflects a growing belief in the Community that a truly common market needs to ensure comparable high health and safety standards for all its workers. The Government support the aim of ensuring that decent comparable standards of health and safety apply throughout the European Community.

Mr. Eric S. Heifer: Will the directive apply to the construction industry?

Mr. Cope: Yes.
Therefore, we accept the main thrust of the proposals. However, there are problems with the proposals as they stand, and the United Kingdom is playing a full part in the negotiations in Brussels in order to improve them. Many of the changes that we want to see are by way of clarification and the removal of excessive detail.
We are conscious of the importance of not imposing unnecessary burdens on industry and of the fact that new requirements can sometimes bear particularly hard on smaller businesses. The United Kingdom was instrumental in securing the inclusion of a requirement in article 118A that health and safety directives should not constrain the creation and development of small and medium-sized companies. We will do our utmost to ensure that that requirement is fully respected. We do not seek special exemptions for the employees of smaller businesses, but we are looking for provisions that are flexible and sensible enough to be applied to all workplaces.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: What is the Government's attitude to the proposal that tight new rules for lighting, heating, ventilation, stairways, and so on, should apply to new buildings but not immediately to old buildings? Will that not discriminate against countries with lots of new factories rather than countries with old ones? If it were approved in that form, would the Government apply it in United Kingdom law and exempt old buildings from those tight rules?

Mr. Cope: I shall respond to my hon. Friend's detailed point at the end of the debate, if he will permit me.

Mr. Tam Dalyell: The Minister has always been good about writing detailed letters, and I thank him for his courtesy in Committee and on the Floor of the House. There is, however, a special problem in some areas. I am thinking particularly of what has happened at the Golden Wonder factory at Broxburn in relation to asbestos and new discoveries regarding its dangers. Will the Minister and the Department be raising this problem in the European Community? I do not ask for an answer off the top of his head, but it is an important matter.

Mr. Cope: I shall make some comments about that as soon as I usefully can.
It is important that the same provisions apply to all workplaces, even small ones. Flexibility is not reducing standards but avoiding a legal straitjacket that removes useful options and obscures real objectives. The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and our approach to the proposing and passing of regulations under it embody that flexible approach. Where possible, regulations are expressed as objectives to be met, leaving employers to decide on the precise means of achieving them. On occasion, requirements need to be precisely drawn, but, where possible, there should be sufficient flexibility to allow different solutions to problems. Our national legislation offers some useful ideas for solving problems with the Commission's proposals.

Mr. Cryer: If the Commission's recommendations and directives are for lower standards than in United Kingdom legislation, would an employer who is challenged to maintain United Kingdom standards and who says, "I prefer the EC recommended levels because I support a


flexible approach" have a right to challenge the application of different United Kingdom standards in the European Court?

Mr. Cope: No, not in the way that the hon. Gentleman suggests. The flexible approach is embodied in regulations proposed to and accepted by the House under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act. In relying on the flexibility of such regulations, an employer would be complying with United Kingdom legislation, which would be satisfactory. If it was held that United Kingdom regulations were lower than the minimum suggested in a directive, the employer might be able to argue in the European Court that standards in the United Kingdom were not high enough. That is the opposite of what the hon. Gentleman was suggesting.
There are six proposals before us, but only the framework directive is at an advanced stage of negotiation. It has been discussed a number of times in the Council of Ministers and the social questions working group. It sets out the employer's basic responsibilities to assess risks and introduce the necessary measures. Much of the directive is consistent with requirements in the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act and the subsidiary legislation.
We are still working hard on one important problem. We need to ensure that the directive encompasses the concept of "so far as is reasonably practical." This concept runs all the way through the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act, the subsidiary legislation and the guidance under the Act. The problem with these documents is essentially legal, stemming from the absence in United Kingdom law of the continental concept of proportionality. Our courts must apply the law exactly as it is enacted by Parliament. Continental courts apply the law only as far as it is proportionate to the circumstances. Proportionality therefore allows continental member states to couch their health and safety laws in absolute terms. They enforce them to a standard equivalent to "so far as is reasonably practicable", but it is crucial that we find an acceptable way for the United Kingdom to implement the directive using "so far as is reasonably practicable," where appropriate, and in line with our tradition of enforcing the letter of the law. We shall continue to try to persuade the Commission and other member states of the importance of this issue and gain their co-operation in reaching a solution.

Mr. Cash: Does my hon. Friend agree that there are serious problems because some member states do not have the administrative machinery for the enforcement of provisions in many of these directives? Therefore, the consequence could and probably will be that, although we are engaged on an entirely constructive and helpful harmonisation programme, the fact that some member states may not want or be prepared to enforce the legislation will produce inequities and reduce the level of the playing field that we all want. As this is of particular importance to small and medium-sized businesses, we must ensure that other member states honour their obligations. What can the Minister do about it?

Mr. Cope: We are conscious of the enforcement problem, as is the Commission and the Council of Ministers. The problem has already been raised and I have no doubt that it will be again. The enforcement machinery differs considerably between member states. Much work is being done to ensure that we are all aware of other

countries' enforcement procedures. Indeed, there has been much exchange between our factoray inspectorte and its equivalent in other countries. Much thought is being given to methods of evening out the procedures. The Commission is concerned about the central role that it must play.
The five subsidiary directives referred to in the motion are at a much earlier stage of negotiation. Four have been discussed to some extent in the Council machinery, but much negotiation lies ahead. The fifth directive, on visual display units, has not been discussed. We believe that VDU work is sufficiently and appropriately covered by the general health and safety legislation and the framework directive. We do not believe that a specific directive on VDUs is appropriate.
The other two proposals on the use of machines and personal protective equipment are complementary to proposals for trading directives under article 100A of the treaty, which is central to the removal of technical barriers to trade in the Community. Directives under article 100A embody a new approach to the harmonisation of product standards and are limited to setting broadly drawn essential safety requirements. If those requirements are met, products will be free to be traded throughout the Community. Technical standards are left to the Eurpoean standards bodies to define, and if a product complies with the appropriate standards it is presumed to comply with the directive.
As European standards take time to prepare, most of the directives lay down a procedure whereby suitable national standards can be used during the interim. British Standards Institution standards will apply in the United Kingdom. Each directive will specify the means of proving conformity with its requirements. This may involve some form of independent third-party assessment of varying degrees of rigour. Generally speaking, the greater the safety implications, the more stringent the procedures are likely to be, as one would expect.
The proposed trading directive on personal protective equipment follows this pattern. The Government welcome the aim of ensuring Community-wide high standards in this important area. In the negotiations we intend to ensure that present safety levels enjoyed in the United Kingdom are not reduced, while minimising additional burdens on manufacturers.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: Employers throughout the country are anxious to know the Government's view and the likely outcome of the statements on obligations in respect of worker representatives. The Minister will be aware that article 10 clearly states that workers' representatives will be entitled to time off without loss of pay to fulfil their obligations under this directive. On page 5 of the letter from Brussels dated 17 March, we find that they should be protected against dismissal or any other adverse treatment related to their activities as worker representatives. That is a fundamental change in the British law governing trade union worker representatives and their entitlements.
What is the Government's view of this, and what is likely to happen? What is a worker's representative in a non-unionised factory?

Mr. Cope: The directive should not undermine the employer's primary responsibility. The employer must be


responsible primarily for health and safety on his premises and in the working environment. We have the support of other member states on this.
As regards the articles to which my hon. Friend referred, which relates to employers consulting their employees, we are optimistic that the final text will be broadly in line with the Safety Representatives and Safety Committees Regulations 1977, which already apply in this country. I appreciate that the regulations differ when applied to unionised and non-unionised workplaces, but we still believe that the 1977 regulations will cover the matter.

Mr. Jonathan Aitken: What precisely is the basis for my hon. Friend's optimism that the final text will reflect the line of thought he has just outlined? The draft of the European statutes and the texts of some of Monsieur Delors' most recent speeches and pronouncements make it clear that the direction in which the Commission wishes to lead Europe is one of massive worker participation—worker membership of boards and elected committees. The whole thrust of European legislation is to give workers far more say and rights than they have under the legislation that my hon. Friend optimistically believes will be included in the final text.

Mr. Cope: My hon. Friend knows some of the Government's views about these matters. They do not arise in the context of these proposals, however. The reason for my optimism is the way in which the discussions have gone so far in the Council of Ministers and the working groups. Allied to that is the way in which the United Kingdom arguments have been received so far in the Community.

Mr. Cash: I do not want to press too many points on the Minister at this stage as there will be opportunities for speeches. However, article 7 of the directive states:
The employer is required to involve the workers".
The problem is that that imposes a strict obligation to involve workers and/or their representatives in drawing up a list of things with which I shall not weary the Minister at this stage. They are clearly set out in article 7.
There is a problem with the wording—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Briefly.

Mr. Cash: As for the standards to which my hon. Friend referred, the explanatory memorandum signed by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Trade and Industry, which was issued recently, says this about financial implications:
The financial effects for business are unclear at present as it is not known what attestation procedures will be required for each item of protective equipment.
In a nutshell, the problem is whether these attestation procedures will have financial implications that cannot be costed at present.

Mr. Cope: On the second point, we are pressing for greater detail about the financial effects. That is one of the matters that we have raised in the negotiations.
The proposed trading directive on personal protective equipment follows the pattern that I was outlining. The Government welcome the aim of ensuring Community-wide standards in this important area. We want to increase the safety levels that are enjoyed here. Of

course, the proposal in some respects requires more comprehensive safeguards than current United Kingdom legislation provides and, if it is adopted in its present form, new regulations may be required. I hasten to add, especially for the benefit of the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer), that such new regulations will come to this House for decision. We shall also consult interested bodies in the usual way on any legislative changes that appear to be necessary.

Mr. Cryer: Presumably the regulations will be made under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, which is the empowering primary legislation. Will the Minister confirm that that Act requires all regulations made under it at least to maintain and improve the standards of existing health and safety at work legislation? Is it true that it would be impossible for the Minister to lower standards under United Kingdom legislation if the Government maintain this way of producing statutory instruments?

Mr. Cope: Yes, it would be impossible under the Act for us to lower standards because of section 2(1), which I think has that effect. Any new regulations would most likely be introduced under that section, although we are speaking hypothetically now.

Rev. Ian Paisley: The Minister said that if there was a change it would come before the House. Will that be done by means of an Order in Council, negative or positive orders, or what? The document states that most of the necessary changes could be effected by regulations under the enabling powers. The Minister knows full well that Ministers could use enabling powers that would not come before the House.

Mr. Cope: We are discussing hypothetical changes in regulations. I cannot lay down absolutely the precise terms in which they would come forward. The most likely form, as I told the hon. Member for Bradford, South, would be under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.

Mr. Heffer: I understand that this is a consultative document about which we are being asked for our views. It then returns to the Commission, which may or may not change the proposals in it. Ministers will discuss them and then decide. How will they return to the House? Will we have the right to talk about them or to vote on them? Will we simply be instructed about the outcome. People in this country want to know what our role in this legislation is, and we have a right to be told the position clearly.

Mr. Cope: I shall try to spell it out as clearly as possible, but I believe that it is well understood that the regulations and all the directives provide minimum standards. After this debate and discussion of the points made in it, discussion will continue in the Council of Ministers and in the expert committees. Expert opinion is sought on many of these detailed matters. A parallel discussion will continue in the European Parliament. Ultimately, the documents will come before the Council of Ministers for decision. In most cases, the decision will be made under article 118A, which means qualified voting.
If the Council of Ministers reaches a unanimous decision, the document will become a directive. If it does not, the European Parliament will play a larger role in producing amendments. Under the procedures of the Community, the document in its final form will become Community law. That would lay down minimum


standards. It is then for each member Government to determine whether their legislation complies with the minimum standards—for example, whether the requirements include the wearing of a hard hat on a construction site or in a heavy workshop. We believe that most of our standards are higher than those applied elsewhere, but, if we reached the conclusion that our standards were not above the minimum laid down, we should have to return to the House, almost certainly under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act, to propose a different regulation for decision by the House.

Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Am I right in believing that if the Danes and the Italians were to support us in voting against a regulation, that would not be a qualified majority?

Mr. Cope: I do not recall the figures on the qualified majority, but I shall answer my hon. Friend later when I have had an opportunity to do the arithmetic.
Because of the procedure that I described to the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer), it is too early to say precisely which form the directives will take. None will be adopted unless it is acceptable to a majority of member states. But the high standards set by our legislation or established in practice will stand us in good stead in the negotiations, as well as in the future when minimum standards are adopted. The instruments can only improve health and safety in the United Kingdom.
There is no easy sliding scale of bad, medium and good by which one can measure a company's health and safety standards. There are often valid alternative approaches to individual problems, and an entire regime is even more difficult to grade. In any case, this is not a static scene. Everyone is learning all the time, new hazards arise and new ways of dealing with old hazards arise all the time. The countries of Europe learn from each other. But health and safety standards in the United Kingdom are better than those in most of our European partner countries.
Nothing in the European documents could lower our standards. They propose only minimum standards, and we are free to continue the higher standards in our domestic legislation if we wish. If we believe that to be right, we shall do so. We are also free to introduce higher standards in the future.

Mr. Nigel Spearing: I apologise for missing the first part of the Minister's statement. Does he agree that, although it is not mandatory to adopt the minimum standards, once the single market is in place the Government may receive representations from employers' organisations and others saying that our higher standards discriminate against them unfairly because they involve extra costs? Is that not a probability?

Mr. Cope: It is a possibility, but our standards are accepted by employers. In any case, we do not wish to lower our standards and certainly could not do so by regulation under section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act. Of course, we could introduce primary legislation, but that would require full discussion in the House. In all cases, the regulations that apply here are and will continue to be those which are laid down by Parliament. All that the documents do is to lay down the minimum standards that we and our partners must maintain.
Our standards will not slip, but, as the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) said, employers could perceive problems at the other end of the scale. If the requirements are too bureaucratic or restrictive, they will weaken the competitiveness not just of Britain but of the entire Community. Everyone involved in health and safety measures knows that if they are overdone they can bring everything to a standstill and work can become impossible. Over-elaborate precautions are difficult to enforce or to maintain in the work force.
Europe must remain competitive. The idea of the European Community is not just to trade with each other—equal health and safety regulations across the Community would facilitate that—but to have a home market of 320 million people with which to trade with the rest of the world. It is no good erecting even hurdles across Europe if we cannot compete elsewhere. The health and safety regime must not be obstructive, but it must be effective. As every employer would recognise if he reflected on it, accidents are usually more expensive than safety precautions, and big accidents are very expensive for employers, in terms not only of money but of human suffering, anxiety and misery. No business can afford accidents.
All health and safety regimes must be a balance of those considerations. The European documents mentioned in the motion provide such a balance. We welcome the principles behind the proposals. I shall do my best to respond to questions asked by hon. Members during the debate. In the meantime, I commend the motion to the House.

Mr. Gavin Strang: It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of health and safety at work. One need only read the statistics on accidents and deaths to recognise the importance of the regulations and other provisions. Last year there were more than 700 deaths and 20,000 major accidents at work, and as many as 20,000 people died from occupational diseases. There can be no dispute about the significance of this legislation and the importance of ensuring that all practical measures are taken to reduce risks to workers.
Responsibility for enforcing pretty well all the regulations that will arise from these directives will rest with the Health and Safety Executive. The Opposition have been critical of the Government's failure to provide adequate resources to the Health and Safety Executive to allow it to carry out its important work. It was as a result of pressure from the Labour party, and during a debate initiated by the Opposition last December, that the Secretary of State announced that the money available to the executive would be increased by £6·7 million in the current year. He specifically undertook to ensure that there would be 40 more factory and agricultural inspectors, in place by the end of this financial year, in April. I draw his attention to the fact that, according to the latest figures that I received from the Government, at the end of last month there were 776·5 inspectors in place on 1 October.
I trust that the Government will reach their target of 40 more inspectors this year, because that is a modest target. It will still mean that the number of inspectors is very much lower than it was when the Government came to office in 1979. These inspectors have to enforce so many more additional regulations and have so many additional


responsibilities that this increase, welcome as it is, falls a long way short of what is needed. I hope that, if not in this debate, then shortly, the Government will take the opportunity to make it clear that they intend substantially to increase the resources for, and the number of staff working in, the Health and Safety Executive. In 1979 there were 912 agricultural and general factory inspectors compared to the 776·5 that I mentioned earlier.
I was grateful to receive from the Department of Employment, on 27 October, some answers in response to written questions about what responsibilities the Health and Safety Executive had lost and gained since 1979. The losses were listed as the industrial air pollution inspectorate, which was transferred to the Department of the Environment, and the "inspection and enforcement responsibility" in zoos, which was transferred to local authorities. I was, however, given a long list of the responsibilities that the executive had acquired since 1979. These were:

"(i) carriage by road, classification, packaging and labelling of dangerous substances;
(ii) notification of new and existing substances before they are placed on the market;
(iii) action under the European directive on the control of industrial major accident hazards;
(iv) mains gas safety;
(v) asbestos licensing;
(iv) the enforcement of part 3 of the Food and Environmental Protection Act and its related Control of Pesticides regulations."—[Official Report, 27 October 1988; Vol 139. c. 380.]

We must tell the Government, forcefully and firmly, that we believe that they have failed to provide the Health and Safety Executive with the resources that it needs to have the chance effectively to enforce these important regulations.
Naturally, attention has focused on health and safety and accidents generally, particularly in the past couple of years, in the light of the major tragedies of the Herald of Free Enterprise, the King's Cross fire and the Piper Alpha disaster. The Government have to rethink their aproach to these matters. Lives have been lost as a consequence of failure to provide adequate resources to enforce health and safety in various installations and at work generally.

Mr. Cryer: Will my hon. Friend accept that as well as these startling, dramatic and tragic accidents, there has been a continuing erosion of standards, of which the Government are unaware because they no longer collect statistics of those who are off work for three or more days through injury? As a result, if there is a spate of industrial accidents resulting in back injuries, or of hands being chopped off by an imported machine, the Government are no longer aware of that, so they are not able to take remedial action. It is lamentable that the Government are denying information to the Health and Safety Executive, to the trade unions, to workers and to the employers, who may be just as concerned to take remedial action.

Mr. Strang: My hon. Friend is right. That change in the method of recording these accidents was a retrograde step. It is not just that the newer statistics that we are getting as a result of the new procedures are not comparable, but that less information about accidents is available.
We rightly focus a great deal of attention on major accidents and hope that the Government will respond fully

to the King's Cross inquiry and report. However, if someone is killed in an accident involving 100 people, it is no more serious than if a person is killed in an accident involving a couple of people. Therefore, we have to recognise that just as important as the incidents that hit the headlines are all the other accidents which occur throughout the year and which we must do everything that we can to reduce.
The Minister said that Britain's safety standards are usually among the highest in Europe. However, he must accept that they are not necessarily the highest, and that Scandinavia, although it is not in the European Community, sometimes has higher standards than ours, as do the Germans. The fundamental question over the next couple of years is whether, in pursuit of universal standards, Britain equalises down or up.
I can give an example of where standards are higher in West Germany than they are here—an example quoted in an article in The Observer yesterday. The report is headed:
Death probe into DIY best-seller
and says:
Deaths and illness among workers producing Britain's best-selling do-it-yourself timber treatment are being investigated by … the Health and Safety Executive.
It lists the chemicals as lindane, tributyltin oxide and pentachlorophenol, or PCP. As the Minister may know, I have been in correspondence with the hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Lee), the Under-Secretary of State for Employment, about PCP, because of the concern about the use of this chemical. I have also been in correspondence with the German embassy, because this chemical is banned in West Germany. I mention that as an example of German standards being higher than ours. I trust that the Minister, particularly in the light of the report in The Observer, will be able to show the House that the Department is moving quickly in these matters, and will assure us that if it is necessary to ban that chemical, or all three chemicals, the Government will do so and will see that the regulations are effectively carried out. The chemical of particular concern is that which is still in use, PCP.
The directives have arisen as a result of article 118A of the Single European Act. This requires minimum harmonised standards on health and safety to be introduced throughout the European Community by qualified majority voting. Because the directives rely on the majority vote, and not the previous consensus, no individual Government will be able to drag their heels. The effect of article 118A will, nevertheless, be varied. The article is qualified by a section that will allow any Government to avoid stringent impositions. This states, quite simply:
such directives shall avoid imposing administrative, financial and legal constraints in a way which would hold back the creation and development of small and medium sized undertakings.
It is not clear what is understood by "medium sized", but with moves in the 1980s towards smaller companies, it is feasible that a large number of employers could be exempted from the article's provisions.
As I understood it, the Minister of State said that the directives were intended to be sufficiently flexible and would, in practice, apply to all undertakings, regardless of their size. It would be helpful if he would confirm that, as a substantial number of workplaces might not be covered


by the directives and regulations that follow from them. I should be grateful if the Minister would explain what he means by the phrase "medium size" in that context.
Even more important, a harmonised standard might be agreed below the British level which, in many cases, would be unfair. The Government will be afforded the opportunity of reducing British standards, while simultaneously claiming that they are complying with European regulations. Again, there has been some discussion about that and some helpful interventions were made in the Minister's speech. As I understand it, the Government intend standards to be harmonised upwards.
Two issues are involved here. First, there is the question of what the directive will say. We would welcome it if the Government would clarify their intention. Following these directives, a great deal of discussion will take place in a range of specialised committees. The Government must make it clear that they will argue for harmonisation upwards and for the highest and most stringent standards. The highest standards will often, but not always, be found in Britain.

Mr. Heffer: The memorandum states that in most European countries concerned the legislation does not apply to the self-employed. Self employment is growing considerably in the construction industry and is leading to death and injury on a scale that we have not known before. Will my hon. Friend obtain an assurance from the Government that the directive will apply to the self-employed in the construction industry? If it does not, the position will become even more dangerous.

Mr. Strang: My hon. Friend brings me to my second point. We hope that, in general directives, the Government will aim to achieve harmonisation upwards. However, in the case of a directive that would enable lower standards to prevail throughout Britain, we must ensure that the Government maintain the higher standards that the Minister has confirmed this afternoon. To their credit, many of the regulations apply just as much to the self-employed as they do to other employees in, for example, the construction industry. In agriculture, the pesticide regulations, enforced as a consequence of the Food and Environment Protection Act 1985, apply as much to self-employed farmers as they do to farm workers. The agriculture inspector is, rightly, just as concerned about the farmer as he is about the farm worker.
I hope that the Community will include the self-employed in the measure. However, regardless of what it decides, I hope that the Minister will make it clear that, if any directive provides health and safety standards only in respect of employees, there will be no question of the Government eliminating or loosening any regulations that apply to the self-employed in this country.
We should not distinguish between a self-employed person and an employee in respect of health and safety. We might distinguish between a large workplace, a medium-size workplace and a small workplace, but we should not be more concerned about an employee than about a self-employed person. However, we must recognise that, without regulations, some employers would be under commercial pressure to submit their workers to health and safety conditions which they would not accept themselves, in an attempt to maximise their profits. The regulations are designed to reduce that problem.
As the Minister has confirmed, the measure makes specific provision for a member state to maintain higher standards than those agreed. Britain would often be in that position. However, the parts of the Single European Act and the treaty of Rome covering the elimination of import-export restrictions will force Britain to import equipment and goods which conform to European safety standards, but fall well below our standards. The Health and Safety Commission can do nothing in the face of that loss of sovereignty. My hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) mentioned that in his intervention. There is all the more reason for achieving harmonisation upwards, because we do not want equipment to be manufactured to a high standard for use in workplaces and, at the same time, more equipment and machinery to be imported into the country which does not conform to our safety regulations.
Even when the Government have increased the factory inspectorate staff to a more acceptable level, we must recognise that the responsibility for implementing the regulations lies with the management, often with the support and encouragement of trade unions and their health and safety representatives. I hope that the Government will reverse their approach to the provision of greater resources in respect of health and safety at work and, as a result of the parent directive, rethink their approach to the crucial role that trade union representatives can play in the workplace in maintaining and improving health and safety standards.
As the Minister said, the framework directive is accompanied by five daughter directives. The framework directive places general health and safety responsibilities on the employer, who would be required
—to evaluate health and safety risks and introduce preventive measures … to designate competent personnel or to use outside agencies or individuals; to make arrangements for first-aid, fire precautions, and emergency procedures; to maintain certain records and to draw up reports on accidents and diseases; to provide information to workers; to consult workers or their representatives on health and safety measures; to provide health and safety training for workers, to allow workers' representatives with specific responsibilities for health and safety time off with pay to carry out their responsibilities and to allow them to receive appropriate training.
I do not think that any Opposition Members would fault those objectives, and I should like to think that the House would be unanimous in its support of them. That is why we welcome the general framework directives.
The five daughter directives relate to workplaces, work equipment, personal protective equipment, work with VDUs and the handling of heavy loads. The Minister of State referred specifically to the daughter directive relating to VDUs. One might say that the reason why we shall not need to change our legislation to conform with the directive on VDUs is that Britain does not have regulations and legislation that govern their use. I was interested to hear the Minister imply that he doubted whether there was a case for such a directive. I hope that he will make some attempt to justify that.
There have been many reports that workers' health can be damaged by the use of VDUs. The directive refers to the need for workers to be given eye tests, and, of course, such eye tests must be carried out regularly to monitor any adverse affects. Another question about VDUs is the low-level radiation that they generate. There is a need to ensure that people do not work in close proximity to


VDUs, particularly to the rear of them. The Government should think again if they are arguing against the principle of a directive to govern VDUs.

Mr. Cope: I apologise for perhaps not having made it clear enough that we believe that VDUs should be governed by general regulations, by the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and other legislation. We are arguing about whether specific regulations are needed to cover VDUs.
Three separate research projects on VDUs are being carried out, which have been commissioned by the Health and Safety Executive, and we shall, of course, study them carefully. At present, medical and scientific evidence suggests strongly that the use of VDUs is not a high-risk activity and that it can be covered by general health and safety at work regulations and by the equivalent European regulations.

Mr. Strang: I understand that position, but I think that we shall return to the subject in the years ahead. I must tell the Minister that I doubt whether his view will be sustained for many more years. The Minister referred to research that is being conducted, and we shall be interested to learn the results. A dialogue will no doubt ensue. I realise that we do not introduce regulations for the sake of it, but do so on the basis of hard evidence and the evidence on VDUs will need to be examined. There is no doubt that many employees and trade unions are worried about the effects of VDUs, and I doubt whether they are convinced that there is no need for directives and regulations such as those that apply to other equipment and machinery.
The hon. Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) referred to the possibility that different standards might apply to new workplaces and existing workplaces. That question arises when one considers the daughter directive, and it is an important one. If a distinction is to be made between new and existing workplaces, that can be justified only if the new workplaces are subject to higher standards. I presume that we shall seek to make major improvements in standards and to impose more stringent conditions for new workplaces, so it will not be practical to expect all existing workplaces to change to new machinery or practices overnight. Provided that new workplaces have to meet higher standards, we shall be prepared to consider differing standards between new and existing workplaces.
My next point is equally valid. If it is believed to be necessary to make a distinction between the standards that apply to new and existing workplaces, the period during which that applies should be finite. I should take a considerable amount of persuading that the period should ever be more than five years. Existing workplaces should have five years in which to modify or replace equipment, alter buildings or make other changes to achieve the standards that will be enforced in new workplaces. As we are trying to achieve higher standards, the different standards should operate in parallel for a limited time. That approach would be acceptable. Of course, an ideal approach, when practical, would be to ensure that standards are universal.
I should like to reiterate a point that I believe to be important. I hope that the Minister will be forthright and give the House an undertaking that the Government are not prepared to accept any erosion in the standard of our

regulations on health and safety at work as a result of harmonisation or European Community directives. In some limited instances, that may mean that our employers will have to meet standards that are significantly more stringent—even with the new directives—than those in certain European countries and that they may have higher costs.
We must take a clear stand on these matters, and I hope that the Government will make it clear that there will never come a time when, as a result of the directive and subsequent discussions, they will come to the House and argue that, on the grounds of competition, there must be a reduction in our standards. I hope that the Minister will give a clear undertaking on that and that the Government will insist on maintaining—or improving—standards year by year. That is the only way in which we can reduce the large number of deaths from occupational diseases. We do not know, for example, how many people who die from cancer have contracted it as a result of conditions at work. As industry becomes more complex and new substances are used, the minimum assurance that the Minister must give—if we are to improve standards—is that no European Community directive will lead to the British Government reducing standards through our domestic regulations.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: What happened before the debate started has proved that we are discussing a substantial topic tonight—the complete review of our health and safety legislation. The most disturbing constitutional aspect of that is that, to the best of my knowledge, although we are discussing fundamental changes in health and safety legislation, I doubt whether commerce and industry have the slightest idea of what we are doing. I doubt whether the trade unions have the slightest idea and I question whether any hon. Member has received representations from, for example, the Confederation of British Industry or the Trades Union Congress about the proposals, many of which are fundamentally important to them.
We are engaged in a discussion in a new kind of democracy in which, sadly, the views of the House of Commons are largely irrelevant, apart from having a minor advisory role. The views of the European Parliament are certainly irrelevant, apart from its having a minor advisory role. Laws are being made for Britain on the structure of the Council of Ministers, with advice from the Commission. This is only the beginning. I hope that industry, commerce and the people of this country are aware of what is happening.

Mr. Cope: I want to reassure my hon. Friend immediately that, to my certain knowledge, the TUC and the CBI are fully aware of the proposals. Only a few days ago, at its request, I went to a meeting of the CBI's safety committee. The CBI showed a deep knowledge of these proposals and I believe that the same deep knowledge exists in the TUC.

Mr. Taylor: I am sure that the CBI and the TUC have been in touch with the Minister, but that underlines my point. I am sure that neither body has the slightest idea of what we—the British Parliament—are doing tonight. Hon. Members are well aware that, when Parliament is to debate legislation over which we have some control, we receive representations from organisations such as the CBI


and the TUC, as well as from individual trade unions and employers' associations. We are now working on a different basis—in a new kind of democracy in which the Houses of Parliament are largely irrelevant and have only a minor advisory role. The fact that the CBI and the TUC have been in touch with the Minister proves that the real decisions are made by the Council of Ministers and the Commission in its advisory capacity.
Perhaps even more worrying is the fact that the Government's view will not necessarily prevail. Whether the Government want it or not, expensive and costly legislation may be imposed on British employers, manufacturers and trade unions. Unfortunately, the process is just beginning. Only last Thursday we debated a provision abolishing a major Act of Parliament against the wishes of the United Kingdom Government and against the wishes, I am sure, of the average United Kingdom consumer. The sooner the people of Britian are aware that we are embarking on a new form of democracy so that they can take it into account, the better served they will be.

Mr. Cash: Does my hon. Friend agree that we are debating the directives because the Select Committee on European Legislation recommended them for debate? I am sure that he would not wish to give the impression that that Committee—or indeed others who, like him, are vigilant in these matters—does not try to ensure that the British Parliament is fully involved.

Mr. Taylor: I should certainly like it if the British Parliament was involved in redrafting the safety legislation. I would in no way wish to discredit the Select Committee, which does an excellent job in recommending matters for debate. However, my hon. Friend, who makes an attempt to study the documents in detail, is fully aware that our views are largely irrelevant. I am sure that hon. Members who care about democracy—

Rev. Ian Paisley: rose—

Mr. Taylor: Just such an hon. Member wishes to intervene.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Is it not a fact that under the present arrangements it is impossible for the House to debate legislation in full, to make amendments or to have a real say in any changes?

Mr. Taylor: The hon. Member is absolutely right. Tonight we are to debate the equivalent of four major Bills, each of which would normally have not only a Second Reading but a detailed Committee stage, during which hon. Members could try to make changes. Only a handful of hon. Members are here for the debate because they are aware not only that our decisions on the documents are irrelevant but that we could not in any case make any changes. We should be kidding ourselves if we suggested that our views were in any way relevant. That was the point that I sought to make. The hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley) probably has a larger mail bag than most hon. Members and he will know that it is normal to receive recommendations, letters and requests for meetings. I suggest that no one outside the House has the slightest idea of what is going on tonight and that, even if he did, it would make very little difference.
We are not discussing a small matter. We are discussing major changes in legislation that could have a substantial

effect—possibly frightening, possibly improving—on the organisation of industry and commerce. We know that the Council of Ministers rather than the Government will decide what happens. Nevertheless, it would help if we could have a broad outline of the view that the Government will take when they go to the Council of Ministers.
I am concerned about the VDU directive, which would add substantially to industry's costs. According to the Minister,
There are … doubts about the usefulness of the proposal
and I wonder whether the Government could give us some idea of the extent to which such a provision would add to costs and whether their view has any support among other member states. That is a most important point.
Secondly, I am concerned about what appears to be a new principle—the principle of different standards being applied to existing firms' old factories and new factories. That would inevitably result in an increase in rentals and an increase in the cost of old factories compared with new factories. We are about to embark on legislation that would permit firms operating in any Community country to apply different safety standards to old and to new buildings.
Probably more important than any other question is whether the Government would be willing to ask about policing. We know that they cannot promise us anything when it comes to the Common Market. They perpetually come forward with great ideas. They repeatedly say that they have pledges on the control of Common Market expenditure. That is just a joke. The EEC merely uses an accountancy device and changes the year from 12 to 10 months. We know what happens then. We have continually heard statements about the reform of the common agricultural policy. If we believe them, we are just kidding ourselves. Nothing happens. Expenditure continues to increase and, although we are promised reductions, they never happen.
I am reminded of the time when as the director of a business I went to Dublin to meet some bankers, who gave us a presentation on the prospects for the Republic of Ireland. A series of wonderful graphs on the wall showed a sharp decline followed by a sharp increase. That gave us the impression that things were improving in the Republic. However, we later discovered that all the upturns related to what they thought would happen in the future. We constantly find that happening with the EEC.
I appreciate that the Government have very limited powers. On the other hand, it would make a huge difference if we could know about policing. Will the new laws that we draw up be applied? Earlier today we heard a splendid statement from the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster about shipbuilding. We know that it is a joke, because, although the Government will obey the sixth directive in the amount that they give to industry, those involved know that if they are turned down in Britain, they can always get a better deal in France and in two other countries in the Community.
The poor old Chancellor of the Exchequer is in a real mess. He is having to change his policies because our trade has gone haywire. We all know that a former positive trade balance with the EEC has become a horrendous deficit, not because of inefficient British managers or lazy British workers but because things happen in other EEC countries that do not happen here. The main problem is with the


Federal Republic of Germany and the inner German trade agreement. We all know that goods flow into East Germany and West Germany because of the inner German trade agreement. When they come here they are meant to have 20 per cent. added value but that does not happen because the policing is the responsibility of the Government of the Federal Republic.
I am worried that, whereas we shall apply the proposals, other countries will not. It is not good enough for the Government to say, "We shall do our best and write to the Commission." If the Minister has any doubts, he should ask the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport what happened to the Southend bus. The regulations were clear. There was an application for a bus service going to Frankfurt but, despite the fact that the law was clear and precise, we had four years of discussion involving the Foreign Secretary and the Under-Secretary, who took infraction proceedings at Brussels. It worries me sick that no matter how hard we try to apply the rules they will simply not be applied elsewhere.
How could we police the proposals? We are transferring responsibility for making at least 80 per cent. of our laws from the House to the EEC. M. Delors was quite right, although I deplore the fact that law-making powers are being switched from the House to the Council of Ministers. If that is to happen, we must ensure that laws are properly applied in different parts of the Community. That means having a mobile and effective police force. It means that there must be someone with authority who can tell a member state on behalf of the Commission that it is breaking the rules, and that action has to be taken. That form of Euro-constitutional policing may be regarded as having frightening implications by some but it would not be nearly as frightening as what is happening at present. We apply 99 per cent. of the rules—although perhaps not all in agriculture—but we know that that is not happening in other countries.
The Minister will have to go along with a proposal that will have the effect of rewriting our health and safety rules. We know that he will not win if he takes issue with it. We know that he will have to tell the House, "We must apply legislation that we do not want. It will damage our industry by adding to its costs." That is not my hon. Friend's fault. He is the most charming and kindly member of the Government, but he cannot overturn the treaty of Rome. He may well have to return to the House and say, "I am sorry, but we must apply these foolish, nasty and irrelevant rules because we lost in the Council of Ministers." I feel sorry for my hon. Friend. He is a kindly and agreeable Minister and entitled to our sympathy.
Before my hon. Friend agrees to the proposal, I ask him to try hard to secure effective policing. It is not good enough to say that the Government will appeal to the Commission or take the matter to the European Court, because my hon. Friend will be aware from the papers that have been placed in the Library that, effectively, the court does not have jurisdiction. The issue rests with individual member states. As I have said, something more will have to be done.
Will the Minister return to tell us that our health and safety rules will have to be changed and that we shall have to have new divisions between old factories and new factories? Will he have to tell us that regulations on the use

of VDUs will have to be introduced? There are one or two Labour Members who still do not like the Common Market, but they will be cheering like mad once they learn what is in the documents. They provide that employees' representatives are entitled to time away from work, without reductions in pay, to consider their responsibilities under the directive. An employer will not be able to sack or get rid of an employee, or suspend him, if he is involved in work which comes within the terms of the directive. That is basically rewriting the Government's employment legislation. There are some people, including perhaps Mr. Arthur Scargill, who will cheer like mad when they become aware of the nature of some of the proposals.
The Minister may have to tell us, "I am sorry, but we must apply this legislation." I appreciate, of course, that in these circumstances the House is pretty irrelevant. It will certainly be irrelevant when about 80 per cent. of our legislation stems from Brussels. It remains vital, however, that we secure proper policing if we take the step—it would have horrified Oliver Cromwell, and probably Charles I as well—of transferring our sovereignty and the responsibility for the making of laws to another legislative body. We must ensure that there is proper policing and implementation in Brussels, which has always been the position here.

Mr. Dalyell: I understand that the hon. Gentleman does not have the necessary resources to make exact calculations, but he has obviously thought about these matters. What would be the general costs of the policing that he advocates?

Mr. Taylor: The costs would be minimal in comparison with the costs of having unequal laws applied. I shall give the hon. Gentleman an example. The House will remember the Southend bus episode and the claim by the Frankfurt lander that there was no suitable place to park a bus. It is necessary to have someone who is in a position to say, "If 800,000 vehicles can be parked in Frankfurt, room can be found for one more bus." There must be someone with authority to say to a member Government, to a länder or a local authority that what it was doing was contrary to the provisions of the treaty and counter to the regulations. A small implementing force would have real effect. There is no point in transferring sovereignty unless we have proper policing.
The Government have no right to determine whether these proposals are enacted. We shall have to try to persuade Denmark, Italy, Greece or Portugal to add their weight to our submissions. The Government cannot say what the law will be because they have no control over what will become law. We cannot say what the law will be because we are in the same position as the Government. Whatever law is applied by the Council of Ministers, it would be nice if it were properly policed and fairly applied.

Mr. John McAllion: The hon. Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) painted an improbable picture of Arthur Scargill and Oliver Cromwell facing each other on opposite Benches. If that were to be the position, I would not like to predict who would come out on top.
The Minister has shown concern about the dilution of the sovereign rights of the House vis-a-vis the European Community and the European Parliament. Concern has been expressed about British employers having to face stricter regulations and health and safety standards than


employers in competitor countries. Concern has been expressed also that harmonisation might lead to an increase in the rights of workers to participate in the management of their companies. We heard no concern expressed about the establishment of acceptable minimum standards of health and safety at work across the European Community and in Britain especially. That is a sad reflection on the priorities of Conservative Members. As my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Strang) said, last year there were 700 deaths as a result of major accidents at work. There have been tens of thousands of deaths as a result of occupational diseases as well as tens of thousands of major accidents.
When the Minister opened the debate, he said that the documents reflect the move towards the single European market in 1992 and increased European activity in improving health and safety at work. It seems that the Minister does not consider that Britain will lag behind other EEC countries. He believes that we shall have to face the task of raising the standards of other European countries so that they match our already high standards. The motion asks the House to support the proposals in principle as a step towards the establishment of comparable high standards of health and safety throughout the Community. The Government are telling us, in effect, that Britain should take the lead in imposing health and safety standards across the EEC. Those are fine words, and it is good to hear the Government profess that they are concerned about the standards of health and safety that apply to workers throughout Europe.
The Government's protestations are hardly convincing. We must consider their record since they took office in 1979. The Minister has said that British standards will not be diluted, but some Conservative Members have said that the key is the administrative machinery in any individual member country and not standards of health and safety that are set out in legislation. There must be effective machinery to enable individual member countries to enforce the standards that are laid down in law to meet the health and safety standards for workplaces. Our administrative machinery leaves much to be desired, and I hope that the Minister will respond to that comment when he replies.
Since 1979–80 the Government have relentlessly pursued expenditure cuts. That has led, directly or indirectly, to a freeze on recruitment to the Health and Safety Executive and a reduction in the strength of the factory inspectorate from 764 in 1979 to fewer than 550 today. There are only 49 factory inspectors for the whole of Scotland. No Government can be proud of such a record. It is all very well for the Minister to profess concern about standards and to talk about raising European standards to the already high British standards, but actions must speak louder than words. The actions of the Government have shown that they lack any commitment to the enforcing of health and safety standards in Britain. They should direct their efforts to enforcement here before they start preaching to other European countries.
Symptomatic of the Government's lack of action in encouraging the enforcement of health and safety standards is the closure of the Health and Safety Executive's office in Dundee in April. It was closed despite the presentation to the House of a petition bearing 4,000 signatures. I presented the petition, which was organised by one of my constituents, Margaret Malcolm. It united almost all public opinion in the city in support of retaining

the office. The petition was ignored by the Minister and the Government generally. The office was closed despite the fact that in the week preceding closure a blitz by out-of-town inspectors on the construction industry in Dundee led to more than 250 prohibition notices. That highlights the fact that much is left to be desired in terms of health and safety standards in workplaces.
To give some idea of the significance of the issuing of 250 prohibition orders in Dundee, we can compare that with a similar blitz in London which even I, as a representative of Dundee, would admit is a bigger city than mine. In London 350 prohibition notices were issued, yet 250 were issued in Dundee. The Government's answer was to close the Health and Safety Executive office in Dundee and to tell the people there that they will be covered by the offices in Aberdeen and Edinburgh. Because of understaffing, those offices are already overstretched and they will be even further stretched by the closure of the Dundee office.
All that is a far cry from the all-party agreement in 1974 about target staffing of 4,000, including more than 1,050 factory inspectors, for the Health and Safety Executive. Those targets have not been achieved by the Government. The Government have fallen far short of the figures, and there has been a reduction in staff from 764 to fewer than 550 since 1979.
The Minister also boasted that the British figures for fatal accidents were among the best in Europe. What about the figures for major accidents? They have risen 30 per cent. since 1980, during which time staffing levels of the factory inspectorate have fallen by 28 per cent. If the Minister cannot see a connection between those two facts, he is the only one who cannot.
We live in times when the demands on the factory inspectorate and the Health and Safety Executive are increasing. More workers than ever before are covered by the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. For example, the Health Service has lost Crown immunity against prosecution. That means that there are many more workplaces for factory inspectors and other inspectors to cover. New European directives require inspectors to accommodate more detailed and complex standards and to investigate more workplaces more closely.
We live in times when the workplace is becoming ever more dangerous—and the King's Cross and Piper Alpha disasters testify to that. In Dundee last Friday more than 200 16 and 17-year-olds ran out of entitlement to bridging allowance and were forcibly conscripted into training places under the youth training scheme. No one knows what standards of health and safety will apply to those training places because the Government have abolished the area manpower boards which used to have local authority and trade union input to monitor and defend standards for YTS places. Those boards have been swept aside and 16 and 17-year-old youngsters are being forced into jobs in which no one can guarantee that the health and safety standards will be acceptable. It is strange for the Government to boast about their record on health and safety in the light of that.
The Government's commitment to health and safety is entirely a paper one. They do not really mean it. Far from telling us that we should support the directives in principle—which I hope all my colleagues will do tonight—they should tell us what they are going to do to enforce the principles and standards of health and safety which will reach the statute book.
When the Minister replies I hope that he will tell us what the Government intend to do about proper funding and staffing for the Health and Safety Executive and for the factory inspectorate. I hope that he will also tell us whether it will ever be in the Government's remit to reopen the office in Dundee, which the people in Dundee demand should be reopened in the light of increasing dangers to youngsters and many other workers in the city as a result of the lack of application of health and safety standards which the Government should be defending.

Mr. Jonathan Aitken: Like the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. McAllion), we are all in favour of good health and safety at work legislation. It is one of those "motherhood and apple pie" political issues which no elected Member of Parliament can possibly oppose. The vast generalities of principle that we have heard enunciated tonight are in many cases so broad and vague that naturally we are all in favour of them. However, when we get down to the small print in the directives, a new and rather more disturbing picture emerges.
I begin with a strong word of protest which is general to our proceedings this afternoon and specific to this motion. My protest is that it is a physical and parliamentary impossibility for the House to scrutinise EEC directives and documents on the basis requested by the Government today. We are being asked to scrutinise more than 450 pages of highly technical draft legislation, which may have very profound effects and which are of considerable legal complexity, all in the course of half a day's business. That asks us to take part in a charade, a sham and a fraud on our constituents. The health and safety directives will affect every employer, employee, worker and workplace in this country, and they run to more than 175 pages. That is equivalent to three or four major Bills by British domestic legislation standards.
I heartily endorse the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) that, if we were dealing with the directives as British domestic legislation, Committees of this House would examine them for weeks and the Chamber would debate them for days to get the legislation right. However, we are now going to devote no more than an hour or two of debate to 175 highly technical pages and then throw them to the mercy of the Brussels wolves for majority voting. They will never return to this House in a form in which we can influence or change them. The children's fairy story of the emperor who had no clothes has been replaced by the parliamentary story of the House of Commons that has no time and no power.
Even if we do not have legislative power, at least some of us have the will power to warn the House and the country that some of the EEC directives contain unacceptable material of a kind which is in danger of making 1992 a 1066 for Britain and British industry. In saying that, I am doing no more than voicing the great concern expressed by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in Bruges on 20 September when she voiced some anxieties about what Mr. Jacques Delors calls the social dimension of the EEC's legislative programme. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said:

We certainly do not need new regulations which raise the cost of employment and make Europe's labour market less flexible and less competitive with overseas suppliers.
Later in her speech in Bruges she said:
Our aim should not be more and more detailed regulation from the centre.
I am surprised to see the directives and the motion appearing in the name of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, who said one thing in Bruges while her colleagues appear to break her Bruges commandments with the introduction of the directives.
The general principles of the draft directives may be found in the explanatory memorandum on page 2 of the 175-page bundle under discussion. Paragraph 2 states:
The main aims of the proposal are:
to improve the safety and health at the workplace"—
and we all agree with that—
to provide a 'social element' to complement the economic objectives of completion of the internal market.
Paragraph 4.1.2.1. of the financial record sheet, headed
Characteristics of the proposed Directive",
states that the proposal
may be adapted and supplemented … to add a 'social element' to the directives of the 'technical harmonisation—internal market' type which relate to the safety and health of workers … without having to draw up a complete new directive on social aspects in each case.
That reads suspiciously like a complete political blank cheque to add new paragraphs and principles to the draft directives in order to encompass social dimension objectives. I worry not about the health and safety elements of the proposals, but about the social market and social engineering dimension.

Mr. Cash: Does my hon. Friend agree that the proposal before the House significantly pre-dates the Bruges speech? My hon. Friend is correct in saying that the recitals refer to a social element introduced under the directive. Only the other day, during Prime Minister's Question Time, my right hon. Friend stressed the importance of scrutiny. We are engaged in doing precisely that. Obviously we need to get further back in the decision-making process, so that we may deal with such matters at an earlier stage.

Mr. Aitken: My hon. Friend puts his finger on a profound and important point. Of course we should be getting further back in the decision-making process. This is just an empty ritual, in which our words will not be heeded or have any influence. Even the Prime Minister's Bruges speech is not being heeded. It is all very well for my hon. Friend to say, rightly, that that speech post-dated the directives, but I should like to see a thundering good row at the Rhodes summit.

Mr. Cash: We will probably get one.

Mr. Aitken: I think that that is a good bet. At least we are giving more power to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, if that is necessary—which I doubt.
The directive's social engineering content will in the 1990s do for small workplaces and factories what the Fire Precautions Act 1971 did for small seaside landladies and keepers of boarding houses—drive a good many of them out of business in the name of highly theoretical preventive safety standards. If we ever reach the stage where a statue of Mr. Delors is erected in every town where the regulations destroy a business, he will become one of the most famous anti-heroes since Guy Fawkes.
I ask right hon. and hon. Members to consider for a moment the mass of social engineering detail contained in the proposals, which will undoubtedly push up the costs incurred by small factories. I think of the struggling small factory units in my own constituency and what they will have to cope with if the directives are enforced, and I worry profoundly about them. I read, in the 175-page bundle, nuggets such as that to be found in paragraph 2.7.1:
The floors of workplaces shall be level, with no unevenness.
In paragraph 2.7.3:
All-glass partitions … shall be made of safety material.
Paragraph 2.9.4:
Sliding doors shall be fitted with a mechanism to secure them from being lifted off their mountings and falling out.
Paragraph 2.14.3:
Appropriate measures for the protection of non-smokers shall be taken in staff rest rooms.
That is a good health and safety at work directive—or what I shall call an example of social engineering. Paragraph 2.16.1:
A first-aid room shall be provided",
not just a first-aid box, in factories over a certain size. Paragraph 2.5.3:
Climate control installations shall not blow or radiate on to work stations.
Paragraph 2.18.1 states that outdoor workers shall be
protected against inclement weather conditions.
I can imagine shepherds in the Scottish highlands or North sea trawler deckhands calling in the Euro inspector and saying, "Paragraph 2.18.1 says that we should be protected against inclement weather conditions."
Apart from those Utopian ideals, there are pages and pages more of detailed technicalities and regulations covering machines and protective equipment. There are 56 pages of proposals—for example, that personal protective equipment shall take account of ergonomic requirements and of workers' health. It will be a barrack-room lawyer's charter—a lawyer's gravy train. Claims by employees against their employers will surge.
I ask the same basic question that was asked by the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer): will any of the proposed EC legislation raise standards over and above those that already prevail, thanks to our basic legislation, such as the admirable Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974?
Will harmonisation and standardisation of the EEC type mean anything more than higher costs and fewer jobs for British factories? I doubt it. I believe that we are going down a dangerous slippery slope of agreeing willy-nilly to any European proposal. The principles may sound good, but when one does one's homework and studies the documentation—and it took me 11 hours to study the 450 pages of bumf that accompanies these regulations to discover a few salient points—the more one comes to the conclusion that such half-baked, ill-thought-out Euro legislation, when compared to the much sounder legislation on our own statute book, is leading us, in a most un-British way, to adopting legislation that will do our country no good whatsoever and perhaps a great deal of harm.

Mr. Bob Cryer: I do not share the

views somewhat scathingly expressed by the hon. Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken). However, it is an important subject. Each year we lose more working days from industrial injury than from strike action.—usually two or three times more, if one excludes exceptional years such as 1979.
Where I differ from the hon. Member for Thanet, South is in my belief that workers should be provided with level floors. If they are carrying heavy loads, or are manoeuvring delicate items, it is important that floors are level and that workers can move about unimpeded. There should be no difference between us in that regard. Not all workshops have the same thickness of carpeting that we have in the House, or the kind of flooring that is scrupulously maintained. We should try to apply the fairly lush standards to which we are accustomed and bear in mind workers' difficulties.
Where I take issue with the massive documents is that they are a recipe for lowering the standards that we already have from United Kingdom legislation. Those in the Labour party and in the trade union movement who are looking to the Common Market as a way of getting around the British Government in attempting to improve standards are looking for moonshine. Our experience is that the Common Market has never provided any improvements in workers' standards. It has devised several high-sounding phrases, and one may consider, for example, the Vredeling directive, which claimed that workers should have rights to information.
What has happened to that proposal? It has been under review for five years, and will continue being under review because it represents a radical change in existing practice. I support any improvement in workers' rights, as I supported the recommendations of the Bullock committee, but that task is one for the Labour and trade union movement to tackle in the United Kingdom, rather than attempt to do so by a back door method that may or may not work. Our experience is that such attempts do not work.
I share the views that have been expressed about the unsatisfactory nature of this debate. To be required to scrutinise this number of documents and pages in this way is less than satisfactory. It really is outrageous. The point has been made that it is the equivalent of a major item of legislation, such as the Housing Bill, where there would normally be 200 or 300 Lords amendments and hundreds in Committee upstairs. We would usually spend 100 or 150 hours in Committee before the Government subjected the measure to their usual guillotine. Instead, we are here dealing with highly technical and complicated matters in the course of three or four hours in one evening. That is less than satisfactory.
It may be argued that we can scrutinise these matters as a member of the EEC Assembly. Incidentally, I understand that it is now called a Parliament, but I never give it that grandiose and mistaken description. In case right hon. and hon. Members do not know, so-called debate in the Assembly is in reality a stitch-up by party leaders, whereby time is allocated down to the last minute, and a major contribution may last only three or four minutes if the speaker is lucky. No real debate takes place.


Provisions can be altered only by amendments which are tabled and voted on. Most of the Assembly's time is devoted to voting.
The Assembly might vote on these proposals without debate or with hardly a comment. Voting on the electronic machines, which keep breaking down, might take three, four or five hours. It is an illusion that there will be a little democracy in Strasbourg this week when these documents are debated. Hon. Members do not always know that that happens. If they are like me, it is not until they witness this anachronistic charade in the Common Market that they realise it.

Mr. Cash: Did the hon. Gentleman see an article this weekend in The Economist, entitled "Silly Parliament", which illustrates his point? The article referred to a motion which apparently was based on rumours and nothing else, but was passed by a significant majority.

Mr. Cryer: That happens frequently. I do not want to seem like a 19th century constitutionalist. Although there are many points on which one can criticise this place—I am willing to air them—because the system has developed over the years, there are a large number of loopholes allowing Back Benchers like me to raise issues and put forward views. Unsatisfactory though this debate is, compared with the European Assembly we shall have two or three hours of an exchange of views. Because my views do not often accord with the tenets of the Socialist group, the opportunities for the "dissident voice" to be heard in the EEC Assembly are limited. I hate to sound as though I am a 19th century proponent of Parliament, but it is a richness of this place that the dissident voice can be raised frequently.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: If the hon. Gentleman were able to make the excellent speeches in the European Assembly that he can make here, would he at least agree with the basic point that, irrespective of what the European Assembly or the House says, the Council of Ministers can do whatever it likes and ignore the views of the Assembly and the House?

Mr. Cryer: That is true. Commissioner Marin, who is responsible for the production of some of these documents, told the Assembly last month that he was prepared to disagree with its views. He bluntly said that the conciliation machinery of the Single European Act must be invoked and that he did not accept what had been done, so even the Commission appointees, who, as we know, are subject to patronage, can turn round and tell the Assembly where to go, and they frequently do so.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Is it not a fact that, when matters concerning Ministers of the Council are discussed, sometimes their Bench is empty and the Parliament is talking to itself?

Mr. Cryer: There are frequent complaints about that.
Because it is difficult in a short speech to encompass the complexity of these proposals, I shall pick out page 15 in annex I in the pile of documents which starts with a translation of a letter from Mr. Marin and is numbered SOC 43. It is difficult to pick out the relevant quotation. On the minimum requirements referred to in article 4,

paragraph 1, in annex 1 on "The definition of 'machinery' in the Directive concerning the design, manufacture and placing in the market of machinery", the document says:
The moving parts of a machine shall be protected, if the work allows, by a guard to prevent contact with the workers.
Section 14 of the Factories Act 1961 is much more comprehensive. It states:
Every dangerous part of any machinery, other than prime movers and transmission machinery, shall be securely fenced unless it is in such a position or such construction as to be as safe to every person employed or working on the premises as it would be if securely fenced.
The Act imposes an absolute obligation, which compares with the rubbery, qualified statement in the document:
The moving parts of a machine shall be protected, if the work allows, by a guard to prevent contact with the workers.
How does that affect the workers? Because section 14 of the Factories Act 1961 provides an absolute standard, it is much easier for an injured worker to demonstrate to a court—the Act provides for a criminal penalty, but real compensation for a serious injury is obtained through the civil courts—that there has been a breach of the Act. The worker can say, "The employer was negligent and, therefore, my claim will be successful." That is important for a person who will not work again because he has injured his back, lost the use of a limb, or whatever. Many thousands of serious accidents occur every year. The 1961 Act is an important guide to provide some compensation for people who are not likely to work again in their former job or who are likely to have only a light job. I raised that matter during the Minister's speech, but he was not able to give me a clear assurance that the Factories Act 1961 would be retained and given priority over the Common Market proposals.
Any regulations to implement these directives will presumably—the Minister agreed—be introduced under the provisions of the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974. Section 1(2)—

Mr. Cope: I think that I inadvertently referred to section 2(1). The correct provision to which I intended to refer was section 1(2).

Mr. Cryer: I am grateful to the Minister for confirming that I am correct. Section 1(2) states that regulations must be
designed to maintain or improve the standards of health, safety and welfare".
That is a clear statutory obligation on the Minister. No directive to be implemented through regulations could lower standards. The Minister must therefore give a clear assurance to the House that he will not introduce regulations that will breach section 1(2) of the 1974 Act.
It would be useful to be given an assurance that there will be no attempt to repeal the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974. People may say, "It is a well-established Act. We all agree on it." We were all agreed on the Trade Descriptions Act 1972, yet last week an order was passed repealing that legislation because the Commission was challenging it in the European Court.
The Minister may argue that the treaty of Rome provides that member states shall have the right to allow an improved standard if they wish. These directives are being considered under article 118A of the treaty of Rome. The treaty provides an opportunity for both the proponents and the opponents of the directives to go to the European Court. The treaty is not a safeguard. Article 118A says:


Such directives shall avoid imposing administrative, financial and legal constraints in a way which would hold back the creation and development of small and medium-sized undertakings.
An employer could go to the European Court and say that his business was being inhibited by the regulations under the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974 and that he challenged them. Our legislation is, by and large, tried, trusted and well-respected, but it could be open to challenge.
Paragraph 3 of article 118A says:
The provisions adopted pursuant to this Article shall not prevent any Member State from maintaining or introducing more stringent measures for the protection of working conditions compatible with this Treaty.
That provides the Minister with a safeguard, but it is, as is usual with the Common Market, a highly qualified safeguard.
It is unsatisfactory that further legislation should be enacted by means of statutory instruments. Under the affirmative or the negative procedure it is either all or nowt. We cannot amend statutory instruments, although they can be as complicated and comprehensive as primary legislation. It is most unsatisfactory that great chunks of legislation that are being spewed out by the EEC bureaucrats should be debated here so briefly. They will come before the House later in the form of regulations that will be either adopted in their entirety or rejected. The Whips will get to work. They will talk to Conservative Members and get virtually anything that they want through the House, because only a few of them realise how serious it is to erode the powers of the House.
We cannot even enforce uniform standards in this country. I have in my hand a report from the West Yorkshire low pay unit, dated Wednesday 27 April 1988. It points out that accidents in West Yorkshire are increasing. On page 2 the report says:
In the year 1986–87, the rate of local authority inspections per 100 premises covered was Bradford: 49"—
I imagine that under Bradford's new Tory control that number will plummet—
Calderdale: 38; Kirklees: 68; Leeds: 9; and Wakefield: 53.
It does not depend on whether the Conservatives or Labour are in control. Inspections vary, per 100 premises, from nine on the low side to 68 on the high side. How can we except uniformity of inspection in the Common Market by the application of measures that are designed to implement the Single European Act, which is expected to create a single European market in 1992?
There is no inspection of small firms in some EEC states. In other EEC states there is no definition of small firms. Small firms in this country are defined, following the Bolton committee recommendations, as employing up to 200 people, but in other EEC member states small firms are commonly defined as employing fewer than 500 employees. There is a yawning gap. I hope that the Government will fill that yawning gap, or chasm, by creating uniform standards. It is virtually impossible, however, for 12 member states to create uniform standards. In Spain there are virtually no inspections. We can ensure that action is taken in this country, but how can we ensure that action will be taken in Spain, Holland or Belgium? We cannot require their inspectors to prosecute those who flagrantly breach the safety regulations.
United Kingdom inspectors are not too keen on prosecuting offenders. The record of the mines and quarries inspectorate is lamentable. Two workers died because of a fault on a Scotch derrick crane in a Cornish

quarry owned by Amey Roadstone. The inspectorate did not intend to prosecute. It was only after I had asked a number of questions in the House that it eventually decided to prosecute. I was able to bring about that prosecution by exerting pressure in this place, but we do not have a cat in hell's chance of exerting similar pressure in the legislatures of other member states. Inspection and subsequent prosecution where breaches of the regulations have been proved will, to say the least, be patchy.
The Minister has not said what will happen if an employer argues that he is being undercut by, say, Belgian employers because their standard of scrutiny is not so rigorous as ours. How can we prevent an employer from going to the European Court and claiming that the competition is unfair and that under the section of the treaty of Rome that I have quoted United Kingdom standards should be lowered, not raised? The Minister may recall that, in a Committee upstairs that considers merit, regulations are being prepared that will lay down general minimum standards, many of which will be implemented by codes of practice instead of by primary legislation. I suggest to him that the draft regulations ought to be put before the House, not for debate, but so that the House could be consulted about them.
It is a matter of criticism that consultation documents are sent to all sorts of bodies but they are never placed in the Vote Office so that Members can consult them. I refer, not to White Papers or Green Papers, but to routine consultation documents, often of a technical nature, that should be provided for Members of Parliament, but they are not even placed in the House of Commons Library.
Are these regulations in draft form, known as the COSHH—Control of Substances Hazardous to Health—regulations, to supplant primary legislation? Will they depend more on codes of practice and less on primary legislation? Will they be provided to Members of Parliament for their consideration?
The removal of frontiers means that there will be no scrutiny of the importation of dangerous machinery. Under the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974 importers of dangerous machinery are obliged to provide a guarantee that their machines are safe for use by workers, but in practice that does not happen. Dangerous machinery is imported, unbeknown to anybody, and is put into use. Somebody is injured, there is then a hue and cry and the machinery is withdrawn, or guards are put on it or repairs are made. Polish light bulbs were not tested, and they exploded in people's homes. Dressings were imported from India, but they were found to be infected with tetanus, so they were not very useful as first-aid dressings.
That will happen again and again if there is no scrutiny of such imports. If we continue in this lacklustre, haphazard fashion and do not employ a single health and safety at work inspector at any of our ports, imported machinery is likely to be dangerous and to injure people. The French and the Germans will carry on their inspections, not at frontiers, but at exhibitions. They inspect installations as well. We should scrutinise machinery before it is installed.
These regulations, letters and minutes are unsatisfactory and I have strong reservations about them, although not for the reasons that Conservative Members have given. I believe that they will lead to a lowering of safety standards. Defending our people in factories, offices, shops


and railway premises is vital, and to do that we must improve our standards by maintaining our legislation and ensuring that we have enough inspectors to enforce it.

Rev. Ian Paisley: It is appropriate that an hon. Member from Northern Ireland should take part in this debate because we have experienced what is now happening to the House.
Our legislation is done by Order in Council. We get a very limited time for debate—it is sometimes one and a half hours. Although I am able to table and move amendments to legislation that affects Scotland, England and Wales, I cannot table or move amendments to legislation that affects the area that I represent. The House passes detailed legislation affecting Northern Ireland but Northern Ireland Members are unable to amend it.
In the European context, the House will experience the same difficulty. As today, matters will come before the House but hon. Members will be unable to amend proposals or discuss them thoroughly. Out attention has been drawn to an important document, copies of which have been issued to many thousands of workers and managers in the United Kingdom. It is worthy of study by every hon. Member. The Minister made it clear that whatever was decided about the regulations would be decided by majority vote. The document, issued by the European Commission, says the very opposite. It says:
items relating to taxation, the free movement of persons and the rights and interests of employees are excluded and will therefore still require unanimity under the Treaty.
Who is right? Is the Minister right when he says that a decision will be made by majority vote, or is the document sent out by the Commission of the European Communities, which has the authority of Delors himself, correct?
The document makes tremendous claims about what will happen in Britain when that wonderful date of 1992 is reached. We are told that we shall have economic gains of £140 billion or more and that millions of new jobs will be created. I remember the pro-Marketeers busily telling us that joining the Common Market would be a panacea for all our ills. We were told that a vast number of jobs would be created and that the challenge would be for people to step in and claim them. We are all deeply concerned about unemployment in our constituencies, so such promises, which are easily made and heralded in glossy documents, deserve our close attention.
How decisions are made is significant. There are three places where they are made. The European Commission is the initiator and the executive. The Council of Ministers is the decision maker. The European Parliament has a consultative supervisory role. It debates proposed European legislation and produces amendments. I have served with the European Assembly for almost two Sessions now, but one has only to go there to see how these issues are debated and settled.
The hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) also attends the European Assembly. He spoke about the electric machines that are used for voting there. Most of the voting, however, is done simply by the raising of hands for the simple reason that the President tells us that there

is not enough time to use the machines. It is quicker to vote by the raising of hands. People raise their hands for hours on end.

Mr. Cash: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the document raises serious constitutional issues? This is not some vague constitutional theology but a practical issue. Some 50,000 of these documents have been distributed at every level. Every trade association and every company has received one. That process totally—and apparently deliberately—ignores the existence of the United Kingdom Parliament. Ministers are responsible for carrying out Community legislation which is imposed on us as a result of the European Communities Act 1972.

Rev. Ian Paisley: I agree, but the House took the decision to join the Common Market. We agreed the Single European Act. We shall continue to go down this road. As the hon. Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) has said, we have been left with a policing role. It is beyond us now to change what is happening. The House can talk and talk and even vote, but its votes will have no effect because the Council of Ministers will make the decisions. Its decisions will be the law irrespective of whether we like it.
I have a large agricultural sector in my constituency, and we have a processing factory. I was invited, as a Member of the European Assembly, to look around the factory. I spent a day there, and noticed that there were two, three and sometimes four men in each room. I asked who they were and was told that they were EEC inspectors. I was told how many there were. I asked how many I would find if I went that day to a similar factory in France. They said, "You would be fortunate if you saw one." How can any factory compete on those terms? That factory has to pay those inspectors and to police the situation. In those circumstances, it will be impossible for us to compete in the glorious, unlimited market in which millions and billions of pounds can be made.
I agree with the hon. Member for Southend, East that it is a matter of policing and that the House must say to the Common Market, "If these are your rules, they should be the same rules for Spain, Italy, Portugal, France, the Benelux countries and Denmark, and you must keep them." But that is not happening. The same thing happened with fishing when the fisheries Minister of the Republic of Ireland turned a blind eye to the quotas for herring and could not see any ships flying his flag taking herrings above the quota that had been arranged. I went to see the Secretary of State who at the time was a former member of the Royal Navy. I asked him to turn a blind eye, as Nelson did, and do the same for us. He said, "No. If anybody breaks the law, my men will seize their nets and they will pay the price." That is exactly what happened.
We keep the police and EEC rules so well that we are putting our people at a disadvantage. The Common Market goes on breaking its own regulations. In a previous debate today we heard about the directive on shipbuilding. One wonders why they can compete so well, with all the hidden subsidies that they receive.
I am also concerned about the way in which the regulations will be made. I believe that there should be the best possible health and safety for workers and that we should have the highest possible standard. A great deal of good work has been done in the past by workers and by management to bring that about and there is a good


heritage in the workplaces of the United Kingdom which should not in any way be surrendered. It worries me that the memorandum states:
Most of the necessary changes could be effected by Regulations made under the enabling powers of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974".
I should like to ask the Minister—I asked him this before but he did not have time to dwell on the matter—in what way the regulations will be brought before the House. If, for instance, the regulations were rejected by the House, would not the sovereign power of the EEC supersede even the House and would not the laws be brought to bear upon the whole Community? We need some explanation from the Minister on that. He spoke about cases in which powers under the European Communities Act 1972 could be used. Is he proposing an Order in Council system? Will they be affirmative resolutions? Can they be prayed against? What method will be used if any changes are made? It is important that the British people should know what is happening.
I am glad that the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash) has put the document to the Clerk and to the Speaker. I consider that the document challenges the authority of the House. It says that the United Kingdom Parliament has no say in regard to laws. It is not even mentioned that the European Commission, the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament are supreme and that through those channels alone shall the laws of this country be made and applied. That is a most serious constitutional point. The House needs to take cognisance of it and it should be pressed home at every opportunity to the Government, to the Speaker and to the House.

Mr. Elliot Morley: We have had a very interesting argument and some strange alliances have been formed between the two sides of the House on some of the issues of concern. However, the arguments about the loss of sovereignty and involvement of the House are somewhat academic now that we are part of the Common Market. I campaigned against joining the Common Market. Nevertheless, now that we are part of it, we have to accept its rules. The speeches by the Prime Minister, such as the one at Bruges, are empty rhetoric and meaningless in terms of how the procedures will operate, as are her speeches against the common agricultural policy because Britain is only part of the European process. However, it is not all negative and there are advantages in the directives because they apply to all countries.
An argument that has been put to me, and echoed tonight, is that small companies do not object to health and safety legislation so long as that legislation applies fairly across the board and they know that they are not being put at a disadvantage in this country when other countries may be ignoring that legislation. That is relevant to the enforcement of legislation in this country and abroad.
It is likely that the European Parliament will try to impose minimum standards and allow individual countries to decide whether to have higher standards. That is why it is important that the legislation should be seen not as imposing the existing standards for health and safety but the minimum standards.
The Minister will correct me if I am wrong, but I am concerned that the directives do not apply to temporary or mobile work sites. Therefore, they will not apply to

building sites. I believe that one of the major weaknesses of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act is its lack of enforcement in places such as building sites and mobile firms such as contractors.
Accidents on building sites have more than doubled in recent years. Only in the past few weeks one of my constituents who was working on a building site in the south of England was tragically killed. I cannot say much about that because there will be an inquest. In another case in my constituency contractors working for the British Oxygen Company were concerned when one of the workers contracted legionnaire's disease. I understand that even though they were concerned about that issue, and even though the Health and Safety Executive was called in—I am not criticising the company which went through all the proper channels for dealing with the case—the workers were ordered to go back to work or face the sack. It concerns me that people should be put in that invidious position before they had been reassured that the risks to their health and safety had been cleared and that the correct procedures had been followed to their satisfaction.
With only just over 500 health and safety inspectors in Britain, how can we be sure that we can enforce the legislation in this country, let alone in Europe? I suspect that when the directives go to other European Paliaments, people there will say, "Look at the United Kingdom. Have we any confidence that it can enforce the regulations?".
The same arguments that we have heard tonight about unfair competition and other countries not applying the letter of the law as closely as we do will be applied against us. We should put our own house in order. Unless we have the correct enforcement procedures and the correct number of inspectors, and unless we keep an eye on building sites, construction sites and contractors' firms, which by their very nature are difficult to watch, the directives and our present laws will simply be a paper tiger with no teeth. They will not be able to protect the work force, which is what they are intended to do. That is the key issue to which we should attend. If we adopt these draft directives, they should be seen to work not only in Europe but in Britain.

Mr. James Cran: I cannot pretend that all the arguments have not been rehearsed ad nauseam—and quite rightly. I associate myself with the remarks made on both sides of the Chamber on the importance of the issues before us. I also add my voice to the condemnation of the fact that we have no time to deal with these major changes.
I am somewhat mollified by what my right hon. Friend the Minister said. I hope that he will forgive me when I say that I shall look carefully at Hansard tomorrow. I think that he will agree with me that the representative bodies are worried by the draft directives. They feel that if they are allowed to go through unamended, the competitiveness of individual companies may be adversely affected. I know that that point has been made to my right hon. Friend and that the industrial sector in Britain hopes that the draft directives will be heavily amended.
I agree with those who have said that the ball is in the Government's court. As a Member of Parliament, I shall be able to say a great deal about the directives, but I shall have no influence on the matter.
The approach and concept of the draft directives are defective. We have talked about high standards and, in the United Kingdom, high standards are not a problem. I think that it is accepted on both sides of the House that standards in the United Kingdom are very high. The problem—and I am grateful that my right hon. Friend the Minister dealt with it—is that these are very detailed directives and they are a departure from what we have been used to in the United Kingdom in terms of health and safety legislation. I say to my right hon. Friend the Minister, in as polite but strong terms as I can, that the directives will not help employers in any way. Those involved know from experience that the more detailed the health and safety legislation, the lower the standard at which companies tend to implement it.
I agree heartily with the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer), who is not now in the Chamber. I thought that I might feel uncomfortable agreeing with him but I do not, because he was correct. There is a danger that, if the directives go through unamended, there will be a drop in standards in the United Kingdom, and I would be against that. As has been said, that will apply particularly to small and medium-sized enterprises. Is that not ironic when one looks at paragraph 4 of article 118A of the Single European Act, which says that the directives should impose as few constraints as possible on small and medium-sized businesses? The draft directives will do the opposite. That is said not only by me but by the representatives of British firms and companies.
I have looked at many regulations affecting industry over the years, and I can say that these draft directives bear all the hallmarks of excessive haste in drafting. I have found no one who deals with issues such as this who disagrees with that proposition. There has been inadequate consultation by the European Commission, but not by the Government. The Government have been trying to rectify the inadequate consultation. It is regrettable that the little representation sought by the EEC has been largely ignored. Ultimately we will have a terrible muddle, the resolution of which will involve the Council of Ministers in endless, protracted discussions.
Absolute safety at work is impossible. Anyone who has anything to do with safety at work is aware of that. However, that does not mean that we are not unified in wanting to attain the highest standards possible. The draft directives try to achieve perfection, but the Confederation of British Industry, in this regard, said:
Requirements in the directives for absolute safety have the potential to force employers to lay off their employees and bring industry to a halt. No employee would ever be allowed to climb a ladder again.
I would be the first to admit that that is a strong statement and may be something of an exaggeration. However, it gives the House the flavour of what the industrial community feels about the draft directives—that in their present form they are unacceptable. I suggest to my right hon. Friend the Minister, as has the industrial community, that the EEC Commission could do no better than to look at what we have achieved under successive Governments of both political persuasions. In Britain we have sought to provide protection
so far as is reasonably practicable.
That is not what is being enshrined in the draft directives.
We must remember that employers in the United Kingdom cannot get away with blatant breaches, because they are subject to scrutiny by the Health and Safety Commission and the courts. On those principles we have achieved some of the highest standards of health and safety in Europe.
A great deal rests on the Government in the negotiations and parleying that has to be done. I have every confidence in my right hon. Friend the Minister because I know what he has achieved in other areas. However, what he has to achieve here is critical. If the draft directives go through unamended, we will have lower standards of health and safety in Britain than any of us want.

Mr. Frank Haynes: We have to say, "I told you so." Many hon. Members who have spoken today said that joining the EEC was the wrong move and that people would rue the day that that decision was made. It is obvious that we were misled by the Minister today about what is in the documents on health and safety at work.
I am sorry that the hon. Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken) is not in his place. He made a typical bosses' contribution. I do not want to make a typical trade union contribution. Safety is the responsibility of management, workers and trade unions, and I stand four square on that. That was my experience throughout many years in the mining industry.
I like some of the suggestions made in the documents, but the Commission has gone over the top. Hon. Members mentioned the Prime Minister's speech in Bruges, and I recalled what we were saying when the application to join the EEC was being made. I did not hear the Prime Minister saying that we should not join; the Government made us join and we must accept it. I hate to think what will happen in 1992. I honestly lose sleep over it because I can visualise many of the rights that we have had for hundreds of years being thrown away. We will be controlled from the other side of the channel; we will lose our sovereignty. I remember the contributions made by the former right hon. Member for South Down, and what he said has come true.
The Minister talked about costs, but what about industry? The prominent industry in my constituency is coal mining. It is a heavy, dangerous industry and it has experienced problems with safety. The management and men work together. Management inspections are made underground and on the surface and workmen's pit inspectors make inspections on the surface and underground, but there is another body that has overall responsibility—Her Majesty's mines and quarries inspectorate, which was set up under the mines and quarries legislation. I do not know how often I have had to ask the Minister when we will have the appropriate number of inspectors. We have nowhere near enough mine inspectors.
Alf Robens was chairman of the National Coal Board. He cut back on this, that and the other, as the Government are doing. He also cut back on spare parts and safety. I worked in the pits, so I knew exactly what was going on. The result was that the number of accidents and fatalities rocketed. If the Minister looks at the figures for fatalities and accidents for that period he will see that I am right. The system worked all right, but not enough was done to prevent accidents.
Lifting is mentioned in the documents. That is an important part of working in mining or heavy industry. People should be taught how to lift because there is a proper way to do it. My hon. Friend the Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Buckley) has experience of the mining industry and knows exactly what I am talking about. There is a way of lifting heavy materials, but there was not enough time to teach miners how to do it. The men would have had to learn in their own time. They were not told that they should have their body in a certain position when lifting heavy things. Back problems were one of the main causes of people being off work.
Compensation has been mentioned. A complete change has taken place in the mining industry. It is no longer the National Coal Board but British Coal, and we have a different kind of management. The amount of compensation won in the courts every year because of negligence by management rockets. The industry has not the right set-up for the prevention of accidents. Somebody does something about a problem only after the horse has bolted.
During the Robens period there were not enough spare parts. There might be a heavy fall on a coal face, but if there were not materials to shore it up the men had to work beneath it. Management was adamant that the machines and supports, which cost millions of pounds, should pay for themselves. I am afraid that with the Government's privatisation policy for the industry we will go back to the bad old days that I worked in many years ago. Nationalisation improved the coal industry; safety was the top priority. Before nationalisation, profit was the top priority, men's earnings were second and safety was third. Safety was almost ignored.
It would seem that we will not have any opportunity to veto these directives. The Minister has not convinced me about the documents; I have been convinced by what his hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Strang) said. I well remember some of the remarks that were made when my hon. Friend and I served on the Committee dealing with the Employment Act 1988. It came out loud and clear what was happening to health and safety throughout Britain. We are not what we should be and I do not think that we will be what we should be under these directives. I think that the Commission has gone over the top, but it is correct in some of the suggestions that it has made. Europe will tell us what we should do.
In the mining industry—I am sorry to harp on about it, but I have a lot of experience of it—we have what we call workmen's pit inspections and the trade union pays for them. If the directives are passed, who will pay for those underground inspections? The trade unions have to pay for inspections done on behalf of the work force. Such inspections are part of the process of making pits safe for people to work in. Having worked under private ownership in years gone by, I fear what may happen if the Government bring in the sort of legislation they have promised. I am afraid we shall return to the pitfalls of those times.
If European legislation on safety for the workers will do any good, I welcome it with open arms; if not, I do not want to know about it. Some of the proposals are good, but I, like every other citizen in the country, want to retain the right for us to make our own decisions. I do not want to give Europe the right to tell us what to do.

Mr. William Cash: Unlike some of my hon. Friends, I am by no means pessimistic about our being able to continue to exercise the necessary influence over legislation emanating from the Community, given good will and determination. I have written a number of articles in The Times over the past year or two on this subject, and I can fairly say that I am by no means anti-European: I am very pro-European. However, I am also in favour of the reality, as compared with what some might call the theology, of democracy. I believe in the importance of this place and its scrutiny processes, as does the Prime Minister, who made that clear in an answer at Question Time recently.
Matters of this sort cannot be shoved under the carpet. We cannot allow legislation that is vital to our constituents to wash over us as if nothing has happened. We must not suppose that the great democratic institution in which we sit has no relevance for, or influence on, such legislation.
My right hon. Friend the Minister, for whom I have the greatest possible respect, gave us to understand that these matters are still under review, and my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley (Mr. Cran), with his great experience of the Confederation of British Industry, made it clear that they require review. The problem is that if the die has already been cast, how can we ensure that the influence of Ministers of the Crown who want change will be felt in the Council of Ministers? The directives with which we are dealing tonight are subject to majority voting under articles 118A and 100A of the Single European Act.
Many members of other national Parliaments in Europe may adopt a view that is similar to ours. I derive some confidence from that, but these matters will require a great deal of intensive consideration by the working groups and the United Kingdom permanent representatives, who must help Ministers to sort out the matter before the Council decision is ultimately adopted. I exhort them to do that.
These proposals are the kind of practical measures to which my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister referred at Bruges. The preamble to the directive refers to the introduction of a social element. I am by no means against many of the proposals in these directives. It is easy for people who want to stifle comment to suppose that we who raise problems that go to the heart of democracy do so because we do not want health and safety at work for workers. I do. Furthermore, I believe in the European Community. It has much to offer, but I will not be an uncritical lap dog of machinery which, as I have tried to point out in my recent articles, is by all accounts becoming increasingly autocratic. I have no intention of ceasing to refer to these important issues.
Turning to matters of detail, my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) rightly said that the six directives amount to what could be regarded as a series of Government Bills on which we could be detained for a long time. I have no intention of going through the directives in detail, but I shall deal with one or two points in them which were brought to my attention by the Engineering Employers Federation, which represents 5,000 member companies in this country. I have no interest to declare in connection with the federation, except to say that I welcome its interest, which partly arose because its members noticed one of my articles and said that they, too, were concerned.
Document COM 88/76 Final, relating to personal protective equipment, states:
Article 118A of the Treaty provides that the Council shall adopt, by means of Directives, minimum requirements for encouraging improvements".
The idea is to encourage, not to oblige. I shall not dwell on the legal niceties of that, but the point needs consideration.
Standards are directly connected with liability and negligence in law. Have the views of insurance companies on these matters been ascertained? When standards are not complied with, and when liability, negligence or failure to perform a function in a reasonable way arises, the bottom line is that someone will have to foot the bill when things go wrong. In the case of Piper Alpha, a massive six-month legal case is already starting to investigate the very health and safety matters that might arise under a directive of this sort.
Have the added costs that might be incurred by small and medium-sized businesses been assessed, and what will the impact of all this be on insurance costs? Have the companies been contacted? Lloyd's and all our other great insurance companies will be directly affected by these proposals. Insurance companies provide a service for which people pay, but the real question is how these provisions will affect people. Where is the level playing field, as I asked in an earlier intervention? If there is no effective system of enforcement in other countries and they do not have to comply with these directives, there will be a strange inversion in the so-called harmonisation process. To be sure, the object of that process is to create a bigger market of 320 million people, all of whom will benefit from the advantages of mutual and free trade in one way or another. But reciprocity is tied up in all this, and if insurance, added costs and enforceability have not been considered sufficiently, I hope that the Minister will do so before the Council decision is adopted.
On item 20 of the explanatory memorandum, my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State said:
The proposal raises no direct public expenditure implications for the Government. The financial effects for business are unclear at present as it is not known what attestation procedures will be required for each item of ppe"—
that is personal protective equipment. I have great respect for my hon. Friend and I am sure that he included that provision to put us on notice that the House should consider this important matter. If the attestation procedures—the standards procedures—have not been calculated, and the financial effects on business remain unclear, we shall have to get that right before the matter is decided in the Council of Ministers.
I would have wished to mention other matters, but time is short and other hon. Members wish to speak in subsequent debates. I shall write to my right hon. Friend setting out the remarks that have been made to me by the Engineering Employers Federation, which represents a huge number of employers and has considered the matter carefully. I hope that he will give those matters his careful attention and that answers to those questions will be reflected in the final decision of the Council of Ministers.

Mr. Cope: This has been a useful debate, and I and my officials will reflect on what has been said. I reassure the House that my immediate response and reflections are not

the end of the process. The points that have been made will influence the Government's stance in the continuing negotiations. I shall respond to as many of them as possible from the notes that I made during the debate.
I have not seen the document relating to 1992 which my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash) produced and on which the hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley) commented, but I assure them that I shall study it carefully.
The hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) asked about the COSHH regulations. They have been laid before the House and will come before us in the normal way. The proposed regulations apply to building sites, as do our present regulations.
Several hon. Members asked me whether other bodies have been consulted. The Health and Safety Commission, which is a tripartite body, has consulted widely. That has been confirmed by hon. Members—not least by my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford—who have quoted representations that were made to them.
Sometimes it is difficult to assess the cost-effectiveness of regulations simply because it is difficult, if not impossible, to assess the cost of accidents that have been avoided. If the adoption of a safety measure avoids an accident, one does not know whether the accident would have happened and it is difficult to assess the cost on that side of the equation. It is much easier to assess the cost to employers of putting regulations into effect, and nothing that I have said has belied the fact that cost assessments must be as good as we can make them.
The main point that has emerged today is hon. Members' anxiety that the regulations represent the equivalent of a major Bill or several Bills. Many of the directives are already covered by United Kingdom law, and in many cases our law goes further than the provisions in the directives. The minimum standards provided for in the directives are exceeded in many cases by British law, and there will be no need to legislate to bring the vast majority of the directives into British law; they already exist.
I reassure hon. Members that, if any of the directives give rise to proposed changes in United Kingdom law, that law will have to be changed in Parliament. Many of those changes will be made under section 1(2) of the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act, which provides for improvements to be introduced by resolution.

Mr. Cash: If legislation is introduced into Parliament following the adoption of the decision, the fact that the decision has been taken, irrespective of whether it overlaps with United Kingdom legislation and the 1974 Act, is determinable by the European Court of Justice. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it does not matter, at any rate in theory, whether we pass subsequent legislation? If it were inconsistent with Community legislation, it would automatically be voidable by the Court of Justice. To that extent, what he said was true, but we must be sure that we get the legislation right as it goes through so that it suits the requirements of our electorate, rather than rely on the fact that it will be interpreted by the Court of Justice.

Mr. Cope: We must be careful to ensure that the legislation suits us. I hesitate to cross legal swords with my hon. Friend, but, as I understand it, thef Court of Justice


would come into it only if someone believed that our law did not comply with the minimum standards laid down. We shall do our best to avoid that.
The hon. Member for Antrim, North mentioned unanimity. Article 100A provides for qualified majority voting on measures to establish the internal market. The rights and interests of workers are excluded from qualified majority voting
save where otherwise provided in this Treaty.
Article 118A is one of those "otherwise" provisions as regards the health and safety of workers, and that is why it requires qualified majority voting. I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster (Dame E. Kellett-Bowman) that the United Kingdom, the Italians and the Danes together form a blocking minority.
Interestingly, it appears from the debate that my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) is keen on uniform standards throughout the Community. I share his desire. That is the purpose behind the regulations.
He seemed at one stage—I may have misunderstood him—to want more inspectors from the European Commission, but it is better for national inspectorates to enforce the regulations. Both we and the European Community need to do our best to ensure that national enforcement is sound throughout the Community.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: What on earth can my right hon. Friend do if the law is ignored in, say, Germany? Can he give us a straight example?

Mr. Cope: Yes. We can take that country to the European Court.
I realise that some of those who have spoken this afternoon, although by no means all, dislike the European Community, or at least British membership of it. As one of those who sometimes has to sit in the Council of Ministers for hours on end, with headphones on, I fleetingly share that sentiment as the hours go by and we discuss matters of this detail in our various languages. However, yesterday, standing by our village war memorial reinforced my belief that it is right for the European nations to work together not only from the economic point of view but from a much deeper point of view.
We have an interest, as many hon. Members have said, in fair competition and equality of health and safety standards throughout Europe, and we would have that interest whether we were in or out of the Community. I believe that these proposals will improve health and safety in Europe. There is much discussion still to go and the documents still need amending, and that is why I commend the motion to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 5211/88 on the safety and health of workers at the workplace and 5762/88 and the Supplementary Explanatory Memorandum submitted by the Department of Trade and Industry on 7th July 1988 on personal protective equipment; supports the proposals in principle as steps towards the establishment of comparable high standards of health and safety throughout the Community and the removal of technical barriers to trade; and endorses the Government's endeavours to secure modifications in negotiations.

Biotechnology

Madam Deputy Speaker (Miss Betty Boothroyd): Before we begin the debate on the next motion, on biotechnology, I point out that the Chair was particularly relaxed in allowing a very wide debate on the last motion. I am sure that hon. Members will not take advantage of that good will and will not repeat arguments that have already been made.

The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. John Cope): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 5836/88 on exposure to biological agents at work, 6397/88 on control of genetically modified organisms and 10399/86 on regulation of biotechnology; supports the proposals in principle as steps towards harmonising safe working practices and improving environmental safety in the field of biotechnology; and endorses the Government's endeavours to secure modifications in negotiations.
I am very much a layman in this matter, and in case there may be others like me, I shall start by setting out in the simplest terms what we are talking about. Biotechnology is the relatively new term that is used for something with ancient origins—the deliberate use by man, for his own purposes, of biological systems and processes. For many centuries, man has used microbes to produce beer, wine, bread, cheese and many other products. We have, in one sense, manipulated genes—for example, in the selective breeding of farm animals, racehorses, or, for that matter, roses. We have, for two centuries, practised vaccination, which is the controlled use of disease-causing microbes to provide immunity against disease.
In the 20th century, the development of biotechnology has proceeded at an ever-increasing pace, to the great benefit of mankind. In medicine, penicillin and other antibiotics have become commonplace; insulin is now produced by genetic manipulation. Improved strains of crops, healthier animals, more effective washing powders, as well as better techniques for dealing with wastes, all owe their progress to biotechnology. There can be no doubt that biotechnology will continue to be responsible, on an ever-increasing scale, for major new advances, which will be the foundation of whole new industries. Many of the most important advances in biotechnology started here in Britain and we should be among the world's leading users industrially and commercially, and we are. However, to maintain this lead, we need, among other things, a sound safety regime, and that is what we have under the Health and Safety Commission and Executive.

Rev. Ian Paisley: What does the
control of genetically modified organisms
mean to the layman?

Mr. Cope: I shall explain that in a moment.
We have much to gain from biotechnology, but we need to make sure that it proceeds safely. It has proved very safe so far, but explosive growth in the subject can be expected over the next few years and the safety regime must be robust enough to permit that without increasing the risks.
The safety regime must also be international. The OECD has been active in this sector, as has the European Community. We are today considering three documents from the Commission—10399/86, which is a "white paper" on a Community framework; 5836/88, which is a


directive on protection of workers in this sector; and 6397/88, which comprises two related directives on the contained use and the deliberate release of genetically modified micro-organisms. All these directives are now the subject of negotiation in Brussels. They have all been prepared with the help of groups of expert officials of member states over a period of 12 months or so, and in these discussions United Kingdom representatives have played their full part.
After the presentation of the directives to the Council of Ministers this summer, the explanatory memoranda were submitted to Parliament—those listed in the motion—and the Health and Safety Executive followed these up by an invitation to the public to comment on any aspect of the proposals. Many have taken advantage of that invitation.

Mr. William Cash: As my right hon. Friend may be aware, I am a member of the Select Committee on European Legislation, and this directive has cropped up on a number of occasions. One of the factors that prompted me to press hard for this matter to be referred to debate I shall explain later, but I have a specific question about the committee of experts to which my right hon. Friend has referred. Could he give us—if not now, later—some idea of the membership of that committee and the extent to which it is left to the self-regulatory mechanism, which ensures that, effectively, the only people who are in a position to comment on the efficacy of these important matters are directly involved by virtue of their professional experience?

Mr. Cope: These are extremely complex matters, and those people who are expert in such matters tend, therefore, to have studied the subject carefully for many years and are working in the area. Laymen, whether politicians or officials, must rely to a considerable extent on those experts. In that sense, it is no different from the law. Those of us who are not lawyers occasionally have to seek guidance from lawyers about the law.
I wish to say a little about each of the proposed directives, although there are close links between them. The main purpose of the directives is to control the use of micro-organisms. The directive covered by explanatory memorandum 5836, on the protection of workers from risks related to exposure to biological agents at work, is general in character and introduces for the first time specific provisions designed to lead to the adoption of minimum requirements for the health and safety of workers concerned.
I want to stress the wide scope of the proposals. They seek to cover research and diagnostic laboratories and other places where there is a deliberate intention to work with micro-organisms. They also include, although admittedly in less depth, places where contact with micro-organisms might be incidental to other work—for example, in the health services, or, perhaps less obviously, in agriculture.
All that mirrors two strands of thought that are generally accepted in this country. We believe that the general principles of occupational hygiene, which apply, for example, to work with chemicals, should also apply to work with micro-organisms. That disposes us to accept the articles dealing with incidental exposure. We have also developed a system of close inspection and control of the

areas of specific work with micro-organisms. The Health and Safety Commission and the Department of Health have developed that system of guidance and inspection within a framework provided by the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and other relevant legislation.
I can assure the House that that general acceptance of the proposals does not mean that we are willing to accept every word of the document without negotiation. Some of the proposals are not particularly clear and others seen to be overdetailed, but, as ever, we are concerned that they should be cost-effective. As negotiations proceed in Brussels, we shall seek improvements. The discussions on this document are still at an early stage.
The two other sets of proposals are comprised in one Council document relating to genetically modified organisms. They are both covered by Council document 6397 and, as they are both closely linked, they are being negotiated in the environment working group, but the areas covered by the two directives are distinct. The first part of the document deals with the contained use of genetically modified organisms. In answer to the question by the hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley), genetic engineering or manipulation—they appear to mean the same thing so far as I can see—means the manipulation of the hereditary molecule of cells, usually by adding extra DNA, the chemical involved, to give the cell special properties. It therefore means modifying the genes of an organism.

Sir Hal Miller: Although this matter comes under the guise of health and safety at work, will my right hon. Friend assure us that the organisms to which he refers as being genetically modified are not human organisms and that as a result of the regulations we shall not legally countenance such modification of human organisms?

Mr. Cope: I can assure my hon. Friend that nothing in the document does anything of the sort.

Mr. Allan Roberts: I do not think that that is an accurate answer. There might not be anything in the document to that effect, but genetically engineered micro-organisms can be used to cure animal diseases, plant diseases, blight and human diseases. They are now used in vaccinations. DNA from human beings is used. That is the present legal position. There is nothing frightening about it. It is not a case of experimenting with embryos.

Mr. Cope: I think that my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash) was concerned about experiments with human embryos, but the hon. Member for Bootle (Mr. Roberts) is right when he says that many of the applications of genetically manipulated or engineered molecules are for pharmaceutical purposes.
The purpose of the first part of this document is to build on the Community's recommendations, relating to registration of such work, which were made in 1982. Laboratory work with genetically modified or manipulated organisms has become well established in this country and elsewhere. I can assure hon. Members that this experimental work is subject to notification to the Health and Safety Commission under the Health and Safety (Genetic Manipulation) Regulations 1978, which comply with the later recommendations of 1982.
The ultimate reason for all this work is to produce something useful to mankind, hence the use of


genetically-manipulated organisms on a larger scale in industry. That large-scale work may encompass the use of genetically-manipulated organisms or other processes outside the definitions that we have used. So far, they have been used chiefly in the production of pharmaceuticals. The main requirements which would be imposed by the contained use proposal are broadly in line with the thinking of the Health and Safety Commission. It has already consulted publicly on its intention to revise the 1978 regulations involving compulsory notification of the use of genetically-manipulated organisms.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: My right hon. Friend has been most helpful. Does he agree that document 865/73 covers human growth hormones which can be used in the pharmaceutical industry to promote human growth as well as plant growth?

Mr. Cope: Certainly, those hormones can be used. One of the conditions treated by products created in that way is dwarfism. Such products are used in the pharmaceutical industry for treating many conditions.
Contained work in this country has always been subject to close control and we do not believe that we have any difficulty in accepting the basic principles in this Community document. The most important principles are safe operation, prior safety assessment and notification of work to national competent authorities which will be responsible for control measures. The directive relating to contained use has made by far the quickest progress so far in negotiations. The explanatory memorandum, which went to the Select Committee in June, explained that to some extent.
Present negotiating concerns centre mainly on definitions of the activities to be covered, distinctions between large and small-scale work, the period of advance notification, commercial confidentiality and some still unresolved points of detail.
The second part of the document is concerned with an even newer activity—releasing genetically modified organisms into the general environment. Experience here is so far limited, but there are many exciting technical possibilities, notably improvements in crop characteristics including disease and pest resistance, extended growing seasons and improved bacteria to control pollution. The document relates to deliberate or planned release. Releases have environmental implications, as well as implications for human health and safety, and the Department of the Environment has a stake in the outcome, as has my Department.
The level of reassurance on safety that the public needs before the release of novel organisms into the environment is obviously greater than that required for securely contained applications. There is, therefore, a system of notification in this country which is based on the Health and Safety Commission's advisory committee on genetic manipulation. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment has recently established the interim advisory committee on introduction, which is an independent scientific committee, to provide additional advice on the ecological aspects of such proposals. Overall, the Government welcome the intention to establish a Community-wide control regime for these matters.
However, the proposals raised some points of doubt and difficulty. For pre-commercial releases for the purpose of research and development, the notification would be to

national authorities. That is in line with the Health and Safety Commission's regulatory proposals, to which I have already referred. For releases of commercial products, national notifications would be circulated to other member states, and the Commission would have the ultimate responsibility for resolving objections. The proposed procedures are rather cumbersome and we need to be convinced that member states are not the best judges of the effects of releases in their own countries.
In recommending the motion to the House, I hope that I have made it clear that we believe that in principle it is right that the same high standards should be attained and maintained throughout the Community. On the other hand, it is necessary to ensure that the directives are justified on scientific, technical and medical grounds. It is also necessary to ensure adequate protection in the most cost-effective and least bureaucratic way, if it is to achieve its purpose in the real world. I invite the House to comment on the proposals. I shall do my best to respond to any points raised either later in the debate or afterwards, if that is more appropriate.

Mr. Gavin Strang: The Opposition broadly support the proposals. The Minister has rightly reminded us of the strength of the British biotechnology industry. He was right to do so, because genetic manipulation has come from work that was done in the 1950s by Dr. James Watson and Francis Crick, who discovered the structure of deoxyribonucleic acid—DNA. Throughout the 1960s, a great deal of work was done in Britain and elsewhere which showed that DNA is the basic genetic material of organisms and that the code that determines how animals, including ourselves, develop is contained in DNA, which is transmitted from parents to offspring.
The Minister said that scientists have been genetically manipulating organisms for a long time. I was surprised that the Minister seemed to classify ordinary breeding as genetic manipulation. I have never heard that interpretation before. There is a quantum leap from selective breeding to improve the strain which has been carried out for centuries to improve crops and livestock, and from the active breeding of micro-organisms, such as bacteria, to the ability artificially to insert additional genetic material to alter the genetic complement of organisms so that they will develop differently.
There is confusion about the position with regard to humans. To my knowledge, there is no recorded instance of the genetic manipulation of human DNA. Of course, use has been made of bacteria that have been genetically manipulated for human purposes, but enormous ethical issues would be raised if there were to be genetic manipulation of human beings—although some genetic diseases could be corrected in that way.

Mr. Cash: The hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Strang), who is well informed on these matters, has no doubt read the book written by a Fellow of New college, Oxford entitled "What sort of people should there be?" It is by no means science fiction and it is generally conceded to be true by those in Edinburgh, not far from the hon. Gentleman's constituency, who are engaged in serious research along those lines. The notion that he has given that the modification of human genetic characteristics is not on the immediate horizon is wide of the mark.

Mr. Strang: I shall qualify what I said. Enormous ethical considerations would be raised by genetic manipulation of human material that aimed to create desirable characteristics in humans as a means of selective breeding. That is different from using genetic manipulation to prevent certain genetically transmitted diseases from developing in human beings.

Mr. Cash: The hon. Gentleman cannot draw a distinction merely on the basis of considering something to be beneficial which is regarded as potentially dangerous by experts, including those who advise the Minister. The principle is whether the modification of genetic characteristics is capable of being brought into effect now or in the immediate future. The answer is yes, as the hon. Gentleman knows.

Mr. Strang: I have not said anything to contradict that.
The point that I tried to make was that the role of genetic manipulation that we are discussing tonight relates to its use in biotechnology and industry. Perhaps there is a role for genetic manipulation in the future in the prevention of certain diseases that are genetically transmitted in human beings and that will involve the manipulation of human genetic material. However, I was referring to a development beyond that, which we should think of as science fiction, which is using genetic manipulation to carry out selective breeding as Hitler and the Third Reich thought of it—the selective breeding of humans to develop a super race. No one has suggested seriously that we would apply genetic manipulation to human beings with that objective, as we do in relation to micro-organisms and to improve livestock.

Mr. Cope: I have agreed with much of what the hon. Gentleman has said. However, I must make it clear that the parts of the directives that deal with laboratories cover work with micro-organisms only and not work with human embryos. That work is not covered by the directives.

Mr. Strang: I take the Minister's point. I am sure that we agree that we are not suggesting that it is ethical or proper to use genetic manipulation to breed super humans.
Some hon. Members may recall that, about a year ago, a front page story in one of the popular Sunday newspapers claimed that human immune deficiency virus had its origin in genetic manipulation. I do not believe that that is true, but it could have been true. That is an extreme and alarming example of what could happen. When one genetically manipulates bacteria and viruses, one cannot be certain what one will produce. That is why it is vital that we should have safeguards, and seek to apply the highest safety standards, particularly in laboratories where people work with genetically manipulated organisms.
It goes without saying that by and large we support the work. Thousands of millions of pounds have been invested in biotechnology industries and only recently have the benefits of that investment come on stream. As the Minister said, biotechnology can lead to the development of new and better drugs. In a whole range of industries micro-organisms rather than chemical processes are used and the application in agriculture is also substantial and widespread. Clearly, we can derive enormous benefits from the genetic manipulation of micro-organisms.
Equally, it is crucial that we should recognise the risks involved and implement the highest safety standards. We

should take all the precautions needed to protect not only the workers directly involved, but the wider community from the potential escape of a dangerous organism.
The "policy implications" paragraph of the explanatory memorandum, which deals with the directive on the contained use of genetically modified organisms, says:
the UK will be seeking some important modifications in the detail of the containment and risk assessment requirements which, as they stand, cannot easily be applied to all contained applications".
The Minister touched on that, but it would help if he could explain the sentence at greater length.
The other directive deals with the release of genetically manipulated organisms into the environment. The application to certain crops immediately comes to mind, but there could also be a role for the process in, for example, the control of pollution. It may be possible genetically to manipulate organisms to make them more effective at carrying out certain functions that are to the benefit of mankind.
We would all agree that it is a major step to release genetically manipulated organisms into the environment. In the overwhelming majority of cases, the organisms will not be substantially different from their natural counterparts. We have to allow for the fact that there are exceptions and we have to guard against the possibility that the properties of a genetically manipulated organism may prove more radically different than was originally envisaged, and may have a deleterious effect. There are ways of seeking to get round that. For example, we could require that any organisms released into the environment must be such that they could not survive in a different habitat. If an organism was to be released into a particular crop, for example, we could ensure that its specifics were such that it could not survive in another.

Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: How would we know that?

Mr. Strang: One can breed organisms to ensure that they have certain qualities before one releases them. The hon. Lady underlines the important factor, on which we all agree, which is that we must be very careful. The process must be strictly controlled.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Following from the hon. Gentleman's argument, does he agree that the notification should be to the national Government rather than outside their territory?

Mr. Strang: I think that there is a case for both. Clearly we want a national authority to authorise such activities. However, the Minister seemed to have no sympathy with the view that the Commission should have some right of approval in relation to the release of organisms. It is perhaps easier for us, in the British Isles, to argue that than it would be for those in some other countries. Suppose that we are talking about the release of an organism in close proximity to the boundaries of two EEC member states. Either the member states which border the country should have a say in the matter or the European Commission at least should have some say. If genetically manipulated micro-organisms were to be released in West Germany for some agricultural purpose it would be perfectly reasonable to require that the authorisation of that release on a commercial scale should not be the prerogative of the national Government alone because the implications could go wider than West Germany. I recognise that in the


first instance and in relation to pre-commercial and post-commercial use the authority should be a national Government.
This is an ongoing process. It is not as though regulations are being introduced for the first time. We have had regulations in place in Britain for a considerable time. The dialogue with the scientists will continue. There is no dispute between the Opposition and the Government about the benefits that can accrue from biotechnology and there should be no dispute about the need in principle for the highest safeguards.
We should welcome the fact that such matters are being discussed in the European Community because it is in our interests. We are concerned about the health and safety of our population, and in some instances developments in other countries—for example, in nuclear power—can affect the health of our population. Surely we are also concerned to improve the health and safety of workers in other countries. If we can contribute to a reduction in accidents in Spain and Italy, we should seek to do so. We do not need to adopt an entirely parochial view of health and safety. The important thing is that we have responsibility for our regulations. We should in no way be prepared to reduce our standards in deference to developments in the EC. However, we should contribute to improving health and safety in the Community and ensure that this is not just a national effort but an attempt to improve standards throughout Europe.

Mr. William Cash: Some months ago I was in the United States, where I had the opportunity to speak to a scientist who represented 6,000 other scientists who, in one way or another, were under his surveillance, monitoring and control. He told me that genetic engineering was worrying him more than anything else, with all the responsibilities that he had. The dangers that are set out in the explanatory memorandum and in other papers were of concern to him. I have in mind wheat strain and other matters. We are aware of the great dangers of the release of micro-organisms. A recent incident in Argentina gave rise to the severe danger of the obliteration of sectors of crops.
The scientist whom I met in the United States was concerned also about the defence implications of biotechnology. He explained that the scientific development of genetic engineering was so sophisticated, difficult and dangerous that he felt that it should be subject to the most rigorous conditions and control. I am no expert, but I am told that it is possible to have a genetically engineered organism that is as yet untriggered. That is what I have been told by someone who is pre-eminent in this discipline. The trigger, rather like a time bomb, is released into the atmosphere, and no one would know that that had happened unless and until the complementary mechanism was attached to it. Apparently the defence implications are extremely serious.
I do not know whether the directive provides the opportunity for the sort of genetic engineering that I have described. I do know, however, that the book "What sort of people should there be?", written by a fellow at New college, Oxford, was abundantly clear on the dangers of genetic engineering in the human context. About two years ago I tabled an early-day motion on the issue. I should make it clear that I have no preconceived view and that I

believe that there could be some advantages to be gained from some of the experiments. I tabled the motion because I wanted a Select Committee to examine the efficacy of the experimentation. Over 150 Members from all parties signed the motion because they, too, wanted the issue to be examined. But such was not to be the case. I understand that the then Opposition spokesman on these matters was not disposed to co-operate with the setting up of such a Select Committee. As a result, we were not able to examine the facts that underlie a vital issue.

Mr. Cope: I assure my hon. Friend that the directive does not give permission for any work of any sort to be carried out in Britain that is not covered by existing legislation. The directive can have the effect only of increasing our controls of this sort of work. Whatever my hon. Friend's concerns may be, they do not arise from the directive.

Mr. Cash: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that intervention. I have read the definitions in the Genetic Manipulation Regulations 1978, in respect of which the Health and Safety Executive contacted me about a year ago. I had extensive discussions and correspondence with the executive. As one who has great respect for my right hon. Friend, I must say to him that, although I accept what he said and appreciate that he is passing on information that he has received, this is not a matter that can be left to a short debate of this sort. I hope that the issues that I have raised can be properly examined at greater leisure.
Documents that can be obtained in the Vote Office explain in great depth the ramifications of biotechnology. There is potential for the dangers that I have described to arise. Further, we are in a multi-billion dollar business. Already genetic engineering has been patented. Animal patents have been taken out, but only after the United States Congress, after intensive discussions, thought that it was right to do so. There are many who still think that it was not right to take that course. The same issues arise with the human application of genetic engineering, which I understand has received a degree of authorisation in the United States. It is subject to patent laws. Conferred upon those who are licensed to conduct the research, therefore, is a huge volume of research activity with the potential for the making of multi-billion dollar profits.
It would be right for us to retain as much control as we could. We have a direct Chernobyl-type interest in the deliberate release of organisms—such a release could take place abroad—that could have a direct impact upon the United Kingdom. I do not fear what might come from abroad, but it would be prudent to have the dangers in mind. I see the need for a degree of integrated and co-ordinated activity. I am concerned that self-regulation should not be left to the experts. It is vital that national Parliaments, in the form of the Select Committee to which I have referred, should be able to ask the relevant questions before it is too late. There is a need for continuing national control, and I am deeply concerned about the treaty base that is under consideration. I understand that it is thought that the procedure could come under article 100A, which invokes majority voting.
If we are conceding the need to work the matter through on a mutual and reciprocal basis, but not accepting that it is vital that we retain a degree of control nationally, what is the point of allowing the issue to be decided by majority voting without a full and extensive


inquiry into the treaty base? There are serious doubts, and this is a vital matter. The Select Committee on European Legislation, of which I am a member, has recently taken evidence from the Treasury Solicitor on the scope and use of article 100A. There are important matters about which we must be careful. If the treaty base is misused, we shall find that biotechnological questions can be decided on a majority vote.
As is shown by the useful documents that have been presented to us, there are already several member states which do not have any regulations to deal with these matters. There are no specific regulations in Greece, Spain or Portugal. Yet those member states—and perhaps others for all I know—will vote in respect of article 100A if that is the adopted treaty base. What on earth would we be doing if we allowed a matter of this kind to be passed if the blocking minority acted against us while we were trying to make sense of the regulations? In some respects we would be in the hands of other member states which not only may not want regulations, but apparently do not have enough information to form judgments about the matter.
My right hon. Friend must take note of the fact that the Select Committee on European Legislation insisted that there should be a debate on this matter before adoption because the issue is extremely important for the future of this country. Therefore, we should ensure that the matter does not go through without very serious and careful consideration.

Mr. Allan Roberts: This is a very important debate. I do not want to delay the House for long, especially as I shall deal with the next debate as the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman.
I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash), because I agreed with 99·9 per cent. of his comments. I hope that the media and others will wake up soon to the significance of the debate taking place generally throughout Europe and elsewhere on genetically engineered micro-organisms. If this debate was about nuclear power, the Press Gallery—to which we cannot refer—would be full. However, biotechnology has the same significance as nuclear power, and in many ways will have the same public perception, debate and argument.
We must consider urgently the release of genetically engineered micro-organisms into the environment. My advice on the psychological perception of environmental risks in this country continues to be that ordinary people are becoming overloaded with the pace of technological change, and opposition to nuclear power has been associated with that. That pace of change leads to genuine concern among the public and a desire for public regulation and democratic accountability of such things as genetically engineered micro-organisms.
There are many exciting opportunities for improved protection of human health from the process of engineering micro-organisms. For example, I would support strongly the replacement of chemical pesticides by target-specific biological agents which do not harm innocuous life forms. That is a much more acceptable environmental alternative than the blanket use of pesticides, which are doing so much harm to our environment. We should also favour the cautious

development of live vaccines for cholera and dysentery which cause so many infant deaths each year in developing countries.
However, we should also be concerned to ensure that commercial pressures and the absence of international regulation do not conspire to eliminate public accountability over new technologies such as genetic engineering. The public have an absolute and fundamental right to understand and participate in decisions that affect their environment. We must try to explain the benefits and risks of the release of genetically engineered micro-organisms into the environment. By stimulating rational public discussion and promising adequate regulatory machinery to control the technology, we will demonstrate that we are responsible and concerned as a Parliament, but not anti-science. The motions go a little way towards assisting that.
It appears that in conferences in the past—a conference was held six or seven months ago on this subject in Cardiff—a number of the ethical issues were completely avoided. It seems that it is easier to discuss the scientific implications than the ethical implications of these engineered micro-organisms.
As the hon. Member for Stafford said, the potential for military or mischievous use of the technology must be considered. For that reason, I propose that we consider the following suggestions. We must call on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development to agree strict international guidelines for the development and release of genetically engineered micro-organisms into the environment. The British Government must take steps to ensure that new techniques of genetic manipulation are not used for military or mischievous purposes.
We need a specific international convention to outlaw military applications of the new technology. It would be easy for an enemy country to release genetically engineered micro-organisms into another country to destroy crops, because organisms designed to kill the pest that kills the crop can be released very effectively among crops. That is very useful. However, it is also possible to release a genetically engineered micro-organism to kill the pest's natural enemy. That would allow crops to be devastated. The Americans could choose to do that in Nicaragua, although I am not suggesting for one minute that they might. Similarly, if the Russians chose to do it in Pakistan, they might, although I am not suggesting that either. We should have an international agreement on that great danger, in the same way as we have an agreement on germ warfare.
There should be a case-by-case assessment of all proposals to release genetically engineered micro-organisms into the environment, with release at the present time being restricted to products with clear benefits to health or the environment. Genetically engineered micro-organisms should be released into the environment only if they are genetically marked with a stable factor other than antibiotic resistance, and if sensitive methods exist for their detection in soil and water.
The other danger is that genetically engineered micro-organisms may be released into the environment, but people may not be aware of them unless they are marked. They cannot be detected in the environment and people do not know what is happening. There must be markers, but not the antibiotic resistance markers, which could cause difficulty.
A regulatory framework must be developed which commands public confidence and which can insist on prior notification, public hearings, independent scientific review and final consent by national regulatory bodies. In this country that should be Parliament.
New products should not subvert the "polluter pays" principle. The fact that some pollutants may in future—and I welcome this—be broken down more efficiently in the environment by genetically engineered micro-organisms being released to attack them should not be used as an excuse for avoiding the treatment of pollutants at source.
There should be an international regulatory agency and convention, with powers to prohibit military applications of the technology and to prevent the release of genetically engineered micro-organisms without the knowledge and acceptance of international and national authorities.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: I am most concerned at the prospect that new techniques concerning genetic manipulation will be controlled no longer by the British Government but under laws determined by the Council of Ministers and passed by majority. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State says that we do not have a great deal to worry about, but I hope that he will answer one or two specific questions.
First, my right hon. Friend commented that this measure contains nothing relating to human factors such as human bodies or foetuses that could be of concern on moral grounds. Does he accept that, even on the basis of the Commission's views and one paper prepared by the Government, it is clear that many micro-organisms are being used as a substitute for specific human items? For example, human growth hormones that were previously obtained from human tissue by means of complicated chemical processes can now be produced by micro-organisms. That is clearly and precisely stated. Does my right hon. Friend accept that, in agriculture, the technique goes a great deal further?
Secondly, I cannot understand my right hon. Friend's comment that these proposals will impart no new powers. One of the directives makes mention of
the deliberate release to the environment of genetically modified organisms.
My understanding is that such a power is not currently available in the United Kingdom or under EC legislation. I also understand from one of the documents that that is considered so controversial in the United States that it has delayed any development in that direction for three years.
The Minister may say that, although there is a directive dealing with the deliberate release into the environment of genetically modified organisms, it does not mean that such will happen. Someone will have to decide, and it may be the Common Market. Perhaps the United Kingdom Government will have some small part to play in such a decision. Nevertheless, to suggest that this is a small matter and one perhaps not best left to the United Kingdom may give the House the wrong impression.
Thirdly, I welcome my right hon. Friend's advice on the explanatory memorandum by the former Minister for Information Technology. who also issued a paper on the subject. He comments that the proposals' main benefit is improved crop yields. If there is one thing that the Common Market does not need as a matter of urgency it is improved crop yields adding considerably to its output

of agricultural produce. Considering the extent of world poverty, it is frightening that, because the Common Market is producing too much, it spends £220 million per week on dumping or destroying food. It seems ridiculous to introduce proposals designed to increase the size, scope and quality of fruit when so much money is being spent destroying more than 1 million tonnes of fruit annually.
We appreciate that this matter is not one on which the views of the House of Commons may count for anything, because it can make no decision. Nor is it a matter on which the European Parliament can decide. All we can do is to express a view to the Government, but even they cannot take a decision because of the majority vote. What is decided about this rather frightful measure will be the responsibility not of the Government but of a majority of member states voting in the Council of Ministers. We can at least say to the Government, "For goodness sake, if we are doing something rather significant, and which some of us may regard as somewhat terrifying, let us begin by telling people exactly what is happening."
This development appears to me, as a layman, to be very significant. It is an area of dramatic technical advance, whereby micro-organisms are being produced to serve as a substitute for human features. They will also be used to change the physical characteristics of human beings. Dwarfism is one example I have mentioned. We also face the fantastic and rather worrying second phase, when we shall permit the release of genetically manipulated organisms into the environment. The Minister cannot say that that does not matter or that it is not controversial.

Mr. Cope: I never said anything of the sort. This is an important matter and I emphasised that in my comments. I never said that it was a small matter. On the contrary, I regard it as extremely important. My hon. Friend is right to stress its importance, but he must not accuse me of saying that it is unimportant.

Mr. Taylor: I am sure that all right hon. and hon. Members present in the Chamber heard the Minister say that there is nothing in the proposals that will allow anyone to do anything they did not previously have the power to do.
We are here dealing with a dramatic new proposal to expand existing powers. Once that happens, those powers will not be under the authority of the House of Commons but under the rules of the European Community, although at least four countries do not have any rules at all. We are considering a directive that the Government's own paper clearly states relates to
the deliberate release to the environment of genetically modified organisms".
My understanding is that no such British power exists.

Mr. Cope: The purpose of the regulations is to extend the strict control that we now have to other countries. My hon. Friend complains that there is no control in other countries, and that is what the directive is all about.

Mr. Taylor: If my right hon. Friend were to say that the deliberate release into the environment of genetically modified organisms is permitted in Britain, that would be a big surprise. It would compare with a paper produced by the former Minister for Information Technology, explanatory memorandum 9501 on document 10399/86 on the Commission's work into biotechnology. The Minister


talked about the second phase as something in the future and something that had been blocked in the United States on safety and environmental grounds.
I do not pretend to be an expert, but the brief exchange that we have had with the Minister has shown that we are dealing with something that is fundamental and something that could affect the environment of every person in the United Kingdom. It is a big decision to pass over to the European Community responsibility for making laws and imposing controls. That worries me, and I am worried even more because, when we eventually get the new laws and new controls, which may not be on these grounds, Britain will have just one voice in the Council. We should all be worried about this matter.
I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister will say a little more on the three specific issues which I have raised.

Rev. Ian Paisley: Just how far-reaching are the regulations that come from Europe has been vividly illustrated. Perhaps not many hon. Members realise how far-reaching this motion is. I speak as a layman. I do not adequately understand what is going on, but the suggestions which have been made worry me, just as they would the people whom we all represent.
This is a matter of great importance. We in Northern Ireland have suffered by having to pass legislation such as this in an hour and a half. If the debate on health and safety had continued until 10 o'clock, this debate could have continued for only an hour and a half. It would be deplorable if we could not alter the legislation or adequately debate the issues in such an important matter.
I have every respect for the Minister—not that that might bring any happiness to him—but he is in deep water because of his statements. He realises that this is a big issue. The hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Strang) said that this was a road that he would not have gone down. The implications are so far-reaching that they are terrifying. Ordinary individuals need to know what is happening. I would not like such a matter to be outside the sovereignty of the House. I should like it decided in the House so that the representatives of the people who have sent us here have a say.

Mr. Nigel Spearing: The hon. Gentleman may be under a misapprehension. Is he aware that the powers to decide on this matter are not in the House or in the Government? If they were, the motion would not contain the phrase
endorses the Government's endeavours to secure modifications in negotiations.
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that if hon. Members who voted two years ago for the amendments to the treaty of Rome, called the Single European Act, had known that the House was giving away its powers to determine these matters within the United Kingdom, they might have thought otherwise?

Rev. Ian Paisley: If the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) had been in the House when I made my first speech today, he would know that I had underscored that point. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Our powers have been abolished. That is why it is so serious a matter. That is why we need to reflect carefully on the effects of its implementation. The point that needs

to be highlighted is that the House will have no authority. We need to know what is to happen so that we can alert our constituents.
We have heard tonight about the real implications of EEC membership. A large degree of the sovereignty of this House has already vanished. The president of the Commission said that 80 per cent. of all laws will be made in Europe, not in the Parliaments of the member states. I think that he was right. That is not acceptable to many people, but it is the truth.

Sir Bernard Braine: I do not doubt for a moment that my right hon. Friend the Minister attaches the highest importance to the proposals to control this new and frightening technology more effectively than it is controlled now, but I do not believe that 99·9 per cent. of my constituents or of hon. Members understand what is involved.
I remind my right hon. Friend that long ago one of the greatest Prime Ministers of this country—and a Conservative one at that—Benjamin Disraeli, said that the first duty of any Government is the health of the people—health in the broadest, protective sense. I do not go all the way with my hon. Friend and dear neighbour the Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) in his attitude to the European Community, but I am tempted to draw the line in this case, and in others, too.
We are told that the proposal deliberately to release genetically modified organisms will be useful and constructive, that it will enhance the quality of life and that it will lead to more efficient agriculture. However, that leads to one conclusion: that when a product has been endorsed under the directive, no member state may impede its marketing throughout the Community unless there is evidence that its use may be subject to further conditions. I do not intend to go into the details. I am not qualified to do so. If, however, something goes wrong, I want to know whether there are any safeguards that will allow us to draw back. Where is the line to be drawn? So far as I can see, no line has been drawn. To borrow the language of another great British Prime Minister "up with that I will not put".

Mr. Cope: I would like to try to reassure some of those hon. Members who have spoken, but perhaps I should first respond to the detailed matters that have been raised.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash) was worried that we seem to be leaving the matter entirely to experts. As I said in an intervetion, when I drew an analogy with lawyers, we need to have these things explained to us by experts. The people involved in discussions on this matter include the Health and Safety Commission's advisory committee on genetic manipulation and the advisory committee on dangerous pathogens. Included are representatives of the Nature Conservancy Council, local authorities, the Trades Union Congress and the Confederation of British Industry, plus the expert scientists who help to guide them. Many people contribute.
The hon. Member for Bootle (Mr. Roberts) was worried about defence implications. I assure him that the United Kingdom abides by international conventions on chemical and biological warfare.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford, like others, was worried about the treaty base. He drew our attention to paragraph 4 of my memorandum 6397 of 24 June. We are interested in what the proper treaty base is. Until we have the final form of the directive, there will be some doubt, but our considerations are to be found in my memorandum.
Several hon. Members wondered whether we are giving greater permission for things to happen in Britain or whether we are handing control over what happens here to the European Commission or the Council of Ministers. We are not passing control over what happens here to other countries. We are trying to extend to other countries in the Community the controls that we have in Britain. This is another directive which lays down minimum standards. It does not prevent our developing or improving standards.

Mr. Spearing: I am grateful to the Minister for giving way, especially as I was not here for his opening speech. Surely what he has said is not entirely the truth. It is true that these documents, if passed in their present form, may, under EEC law, extend the regulations which are to be found in our domestic law to other countries, but any subsequent instruments about control, which will apply universally, will be within the control of the Council, not of the House. Surely to that extent we are passing over powers.

Mr. Cope: We are not passing over powers in the motion before us. If some future proposed legislation does something else, we can consider it, but that is not what is before us.

Mr. Spearing: Precisely.

Mr. Cope: My right hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Sir B. Braine), the Father of the House, spoke of new technology being involved. It is very new and to some people it is frightening. He also spoke about the health of the people. As I said at the beginning, I am a layman in these matters—I suspect that we all are—but my view is that the health of the people has a great deal to gain, and has already gained a great deal, as a result of biotechnology. I have been given many examples of the benefits. I have no doubt that there will be more. Many of the applications of biotechnology and of genetic manipulation have been in pharmaceuticals. I believe that we have already gained a great deal.
There have been references to human growth hormones, which were not invented by genetic manipulation. They predate that. They could be used before, but now they can be produced better and more cleanly by

means of genetic manipulation. That is one advance. In my opening remarks I referred to insulin, and the same applies to that.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: I am sorry to interrupt my right hon. Friend. I hope that he does not think that I am being difficult, but does he accept that the former Minister for Industry and Information Technology wrote in his note to the Committee about human growth hormones that
could only previously be obtained by low yield traditional chemical means or by tissue extraction."?
He was saying that nothing like that could be done before, but it can be done now. It is there in black and white. However, the Minister appeared to be saying that we have been able to do it for a long time but chose not to do so. They cannot both be right.

Mr. Cope: I meant not that we could carry out genetic manipulation but that we could produce those particular hormones. The same is true of insulin for treating diabetes. Insulin was available before from cows, but now we can produce insulin better by means of genetic manipulation. That seems to me to be an example of a new technique being used to produce something that already exists. I did not mean that genetic manipulation is an old technique. It is not. It is a new technique which is being developed all the time. Important advances can be made from it, but those advances should not blind us in any way to the problems, the dangers and the very strict requirements for health and safety and control, particularly of releases, which have been covered in the directive. They should make us more determined to get them right. In Britain we have gone to a lot of trouble to get them right. We are trying to improve our own regulations. The directives try to extend the same principles to other countries in the European Community.
There are wider thoughts. The OECD has already been mentioned. More is happening elsewhere in the wider world, not only in the European Community. However, that is not relevant to our debate today.
We are right to try to improve the directives and to get them adopted by the European Community so that we can enjoy the benefits of biotechnology while at the same time preserving the health and safety of the workers involved in it and that of the public generally. Therefore, I commend the motion to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved.
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 5836/88 on exposure to biological agents at work, 6397/88 on control of genetically modified organisms and 10399/86 on regulation of biotechnology; supports the proposals in principle as steps towards harmonising safe working practices and improving environmental safety in the field of biotechnology; and endorses the Government's endeavours to secure modifications in negotiations.

Tobacco Products

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Mrs. Edwina Currie): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 4192/88 on the labelling of tobacco products and the Supplementary Explanatory Memorandum submitted by the Department of Health on 7th November 1988 and 4193/88 on tar yields of cigarettes; welcomes continued progress towards removing the remaining barriers to trade between Member States; and, in the interests of public health, endorses the aims of reducing the tar yield of cigarettes and of ensuring that Community consumers are adequately warned of the dangers of smoking.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harold Walker): Mr. Speaker has selected the amendment in the names of the hon. Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken) and his hon. Friends.

Mrs. Currie: The proposals concern the harmonisation of national provisions governing maximum tar yields of cigarettes and the labelling of tobacco products. The European Commission states that the proposals form part of the changes needed to eliminate most of the remaining trade barriers in the European Community by the end of 1992 at the latest.
The proposed directives are linked to the European Community Commission's "Europe Against Cancer" programme. That was based on a report by a committee of 12 European cancer experts, which report was welcomed on behalf of the United Kingdom by the Prime Minister on December 1986, when we last held the European presidency.
Tobacco is the main cause of cancer deaths in the European Community, so "Europe Against Cancer" has given priority to prevention in the struggle against tobacco abuse. In the context of that programme a list of 14 measures for a campaign against tobacco has been drawn up, and so far the Commission has proposed directives on five of those. The draft directive on labelling, one of those to be debated today, is the most advanced of all the proposals.
As the harmonisation measures originated in the cancer prevention programme, the proposals to be debated today take as their base a high level of health protection. That is required by paragraph 3 of article 100A of the treaty of Rome, which states that, in the internal market measures concerning health, safety, environmental protection and consumer protection,
The Commission … will take as a base a high level of health protection.
The Commission's proposals are based on the most stringent existing provisions in any European Community member state.
I shall deal first with the proposal on the harmonisation of tobacco labelling. The Commission based its proposals on the Irish model of labelling, which is part of Irish law. Under the proposals there would be a health warning—
Tobacco seriously damages your health"—
on the most visible surface of all tobacco packs and cigarette packs would also carry one of a list of specific warnings on the back. The labelling directive also proposes that cigarette packets should carry numerical information on tar and nicotine yields on the side of the packet. The health warnings and the tar and nicotine yield indications would occupy 5 per cent. of the relevant side.
Cigarettes sold in the United Kingdom have carried health warnings for the past 16 years, through voluntary agreements with the tobacco industry. Those warnings appear on the side of cigarette and hand-rolling tobacco packaging. Also, through the voluntary agreement, cigarette packets in the United Kingdom carry information on tar yield in the form of tar groups—low tar, medium tar and so on.
The proposals of the labelling directive differ from the present United Kingdom system in several ways. First, the Commission envisages that the directives would have to be implemented by law, whereas the present United Kingdom system is voluntary.
Secondly, under the present United Kingdom system only cigarettes and hand-rolling tobacco must carry health warnings. The labelling directive proposes to put a warning on all tobacco packaging, including cigars, pipe tobacco and so on. The proposed system would make warnings more prominent, and some of the proposed health warnings are taken from those already used in the United Kingdom.
The proposals to provide precise numerical information on tar and nicotine yields on cigarette packets would provide consumers with more information than they currently receive in Britain. At present, information on tar yield is expressed in terms of grouping; for example, low and high tar. Under the current United Kingdom system there is no information on nicotine yield on cigarette packs. It is hoped that the draft directive will be discussed by the Council of Ministers on 13 December.
The second proposed directive is on the harmonisation of maximum tar yields of cigarettes and is much less advanced than that on labelling. There is still much to discuss and we do not know what the final form of the proposals will look like, but I can describe what the present draft sets out to do. We all know that every cigarette is harmful to health, whatever its tar yield. There is no such thing as a safe cigarette, and there is no doubt that the risk of cancer is higher if the cigarettes smoked have high tar yield, as it is the tar that causes cancer.
The World Health Organisation has recommended a tar limit of 15 mg per cigarette. The directive aims to achieve that by the end of 1992. Spain has recently passed a royal decree to apply such a limit, and Portugal has recently introduced similar legislation. Following the recommendations of the European Community's committee of cancer experts, the directive also proposes a further reduction of the limit to 12 mg by the end of 1995.
We support the aim of reducing the tar yield of cigarettes, since we started it. For the past 16 years the United Kingdom has had a programme for continuing the reduction of what is known as the "sales weighted average tar yield"—commonly known as SWAT—of cigarettes. That is done by voluntary agreement with the United Kingdom tobacco industry. In that way we have brought the average tar yield of cigarettes down from 21 mg in 1972 to 13·6 mg today—a reduction of one third.
A difference between the proposals in the directive and the United Kingdom's voluntary system is that there is no general tar ceiling for cigarettes in the United Kingdom. However, there is a ceiling for the introduction of new brands, which stands at 14·5 mg. If the draft directive were to be adopted, it would affect 17·5 per cent. of the United Kingdom cigarette market where the tar yield would be above the proposed ceiling. In virtually all those cases the


existing tar yield is between 15 and 18 mg. Brands such as Senior Service, Capstan, and Woodbine would be among those affected in their present formulations.
Lists of tar yield, carbon monoxide and nicotine for brands on sale in the United Kingdom are published by the Government twice yearly and the tables can be found in the Library. The tobacco industry has been reducing the tar yield of its brands and there is a continuing trend towards smoking lower tar cigarettes. By the time any directive comes into force, it is possible that a smaller percentage of the market will be affected.
The voluntary agreement to reduce the "sales weighted average tar yield" of cigarettes has gone a long way towards ensuring that the United Kingdom smoker uses lower tar cigarettes than does the smoker in many other European countries. We hope that further progress will be possible. The future timetable on the draft directive is not clear, but it seems unlikely that it will be ready for the Council in under 12 months.
I should like to share with the House a couple of problems that are associated with the directives. We are concerned to retain the United Kingdom system, whereby voluntary agreements provide the means for controlling the conditions under which cigarettes are marketed. The system is well-established and has been shown to work effectively over many years. It has the advantage of being flexible, as it is negotiated every few years, and we can use that to take account of new concerns and technology. That would be less easy to do with legislation.
We have been arguing strongly in Brussels for the right to implement any directive that may be adopted through our system of voluntary agreements. It has been a general theme in other sectors of regulation and deregulation. We do not take issue with the broad aims of the draft directives, but we wish to keep our system, which has been working well. We shall continue to push for this in further discussions.
Another issue that arises from the draft directives is that each has a clause stating that member states may not prohibit or restrict the sale of products that conform to them. As they stand, this would outlaw present United Kingdom law prohibiting the sale of tobacco to under-16s. Other member states have similar problems. The European Commission is aware of this and is proposing to amend the draft to make it clear that member states may lay down provisions considered necessary to protect citizens' health against the harmful effects of tobacco, as long as the provisions do not affect labelling. It is important that we should be able to maintain the United Kindom's high standard of health protection in this regard, and we shall continue to press strongly for that.

Mr. Robin Cook: I should like to press the Minister on whether the directive will be implemented voluntarily or legally. Will she comment on the report of the Select Committee on European Legislation, which suggests that the Government have received legal advice from the Council's Commission's legal services that legislation will be necessary if the Government are to implement the directive?

Mrs. Currie: Yes, we have received such advice, and the point will be pressed again at the meeting of Council Ministers on 13 December. My hon. Friends who tabled the amendment will be aware that this issue was raised by Mr. Speaker's counsel in March in the annex to the 19th

report of the Select Committee on European Legislation. I note what my hon. Friends say in the amendment, but say that we have, we will and we do. We have raised this issue with the Commission, and will do so with the Council's legal services. We have still to be satisfied that the public health policy content of the directives is within the scope of article 100A3 of the treaty. We must reserve judgment on its appropriateness until we have heard the Commission's explanation.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: Why should the Government reserve their position until they have heard the Commission's views? Surely it is possible for the Government to have a view before they receive the Commission's advice.

Mrs. Currie: We have stated our position clearly. We think that we must put our points of view to the Commission and await its explanation. That is a courtesy to people who are putting points to us. That is also the position that we take on voluntary agreements. We have received legal advice and we hear what is being said. We believe that helping people through voluntary agreements has been successful, and we shall continue to say so in Europe.

Mr. Nigel Spearing: The Minister may not be aware that the Select Committee on European Legislation is conducting an inquiry into the treaty base, but has not yet reported. I should not have thought that acceptance of the amendment would be contrary to anything that the Minister has said. Surely the treaty is asking the Government only to raise the issue. Indeed, the hon. Lady has said that they have and will. Do I ascertain from her remarks that she is resisting the amendment, or is she saying "We have done it and therefore we are accepting it"?

Mrs. Currie: The hon. Gentleman has not heard the debate on the amendment. I am not moving the amendment, but I look forward to that being done by my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken). I notice that the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) has put his name to the amendment.
As part of my preparation for today's debate I read through a number of debates on the subject. I think that I have read almost everything that the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) has said about it, and I enjoyed that very much. I note that he said the same thing over and over again and was answered at the Dispatch Box by a variety of Ministers. The hon. Gentleman does not seem always to have absorbed the gist of what they said, since his subsequent speeches were identical to the earlier ones. I look forward to hearing what he has to say later in this debate should he catch Mr. Deputy Speaker's eye.
The use of article 100A, which is essentially related to the establishment of the functioning of the internal market, is being kept closely under review by the Government. We press for the adoption of a different treaty base when article 100A is considere inappropriate. Although I understand the concerns expressed in the amendment, I cannot accept the implication—I hope that my hon. Friends will understand why—that the use of article 100A is not being kept under close surveillance, so I hope my hon. Friends will not press their amendment.
The Government support progress towards removing barriers to trade between member states. They are also


anxious to maintain and develop health safeguards against smoking. In the United Kingdom the successful development of such safeguards is based on our well-established system of voluntary agreements between the Government and industry. We want to maintain the advantages of that system. We shall continue, in negotiations on these and subsequent directives, to place great emphasis on these important United Kingdom concerns and successes.

Mr. Robin Cook: The Opposition support the thrust of both directives. I understand the constitutional point expressed in the amendment, and I say to all those who have attached their names to it that I find it difficult to disagree with the idea that the directives have more to do with public health than with trade matters, so it is perhaps unfortunate that they are brought before us under this article.
It may have been sensible and salutary for those hon. Members to table their amendment to serve as a warning to the Commission that it will be in some difficulty if it brings in directives in this way about other matters that do not necessarily command the degree of support that the objective of these directives should. I fully support that objective. Having come thus far, it would be wrong to tell the European Commission to return to "Go". The tobacco lobby is immensely skilled in preventing progress on these heads.
With that in mind, I welcome the Minister's speech. It was a great advance on the comments of her noble Friend Lord Skelmersdale, who represented her Department when the matter was discussed in the Council of Ministers. He electrified the atmosphere and entertained the other Health Ministers by saying that he was unhappy about the directives as he took the view that individuals should be free to choose their own method of death—whether from high-tar cigarettes or from throwing themselves in front of the airport bus. I am glad that the Minister did not endorse either proposition.
I strongly support the proposals on labelling which would take the health warning off the side notes of the packet and put them up front on the two larger sides—back and front. That is desirable—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] Because cigarettes kill. Fortunately, the labelling will be toughened to make that the message. As a result of the directive the current British expression, "Smoking can cause cancer," will change to the much more blunt and accurate statement, "Smoking causes cancer." It is important that we make these changes and that the labelling should be as bold and prominent as possible.
Although it is clear from many surveys that smokers well understand that substantial health risks attach to smoking, most smokers still do not believe it will happen to them, despite the overwhelming evidence that one in four of them will die of diseases related to smoking.
I also welcome the other directive, which the Minister described as not having made the same degree of progress and which relates to the limitation on tar yields of cigarettes, but I do so with more reservation than that with which I welcomed the first. Britain's gain from the directive will be marginal, as, by 1992, the ceiling will be 15 mg of tar yield per cigarette, which happens to be the

average sales-weighted index that we have already secured. The effect of the directive will be merely to make the current average a ceiling. That is a gain, but it is a limited gain that will be offset if it gives anyone the mistaken impression that smoking a low tar yield cigarette is safe. That would be a very unfortunate conclusion for anyone to reach.
There are still serious grounds for concern on public health policy about the incidence of cigarette smoking in our nation. I stress the apparent growth of smoking among the very young. It has been documented in several studies that one in four children has acquired the smoking habit by the age of 15, which is very worrying when one considers future trends in smoking. It is unlikely that labelling alone will alter that trend and reverse the incidence of smoking among the very young, especially if those changes in labelling take place in a context in which the tobacco industry spends £100 million a year on advertising tobacco products.
I do not agree with the Minister's praise of the voluntary agreement with the tobacco industry secured by the Government. It is difficult to share her conviction that that voluntary agreement is successful and worthwhile. On the contrary, there is abundant evidence that the tobacco industry uses much ingenuity and fecund imagination in finding ways round all the heads in the voluntary agreement. A case in point is Marlboro, which, under voluntary agreement, cannot place a cowboy in its adverts because it would represent a figure attractive to youngsters. Instead of showing a cowboy, as it does in America, it shows endless shots of horses that would otherwise be ridden by the cowboy, who was presumably just off camera when the photograph was taken.
In Edinburgh, a disturbing survey discovered that a clear majority of tobacconists who carried on business near to children's playgrounds had external tobacco adverts which breached one or more of the heads of the voluntary agreement.
The voluntary agreement is substantially undermined by our tolerance of a remarkable amount of sponsorship of sports by the tobacco industry. A key point in the voluntary agreement is that tobacco should not be connected with success in sport, but the whole point of sponsorship of sport by the tobacco industry is precisely to connect tobacco with success in sport. It also provides a convenient way round the ban on advertising tobacco products on television. On average, one hour a day of television transmission time is given over to covering sports that are sponsored by the tobacco industry, with the remarkable result that most children still believe that tobacco adverts are allowed on television. They have never seen one; all that they have seen is the sponsorship of sports on television.
The most disturbing feature of the Minister's speech was that, given the history of circumvention of the agreement and its ineffectiveness in substantially reducing penetration by the tobacco industry into commercial sponsorship and advertising, at some stage the House will have to take the step that has been taken by more than 20 other countries and introduce a legal ban on tobacco advertising. Those 20 countries were most recently joined by Canada and some Australian states. I am puzzled by the Minister's references to proceeding by voluntary agreement rather than by legislation. It is difficult to


understand how the Minister can give effect to the directive on labelling without contemplating legislation, and I am puzzled by what she said about legal advice.
I understand why, as a matter of public policy, the Government may wish to preserve the voluntary agreement rather than introduce legislation. I believe that they are wrong, but I understand why they may prefer it. I cannot understand why, having received legal advice that it would be necessary to introduce such legislation to adopt the directive, they persist in ignoring it. That can only rest on the fact that there is legal advice available to the Government that counters the legal advice that has been tendered to them by the Council and the Commission. If not, and if the Minister is serious in supporting the directive and welcoming its objective, she will have to accept that it will require legislation. We would welcome such legislation because of the clear principle that it would introduce, that the tobacco industry has to advertise within the law.

Mr. Martin M. Brandon-Bravo: The hon. Gentleman's remarks are very revealing. Is this clear and firm Labour party policy? In my area, about 3,000 people are still employed in the tobacco industry, and probably five times as many as that are pensioners of a famous company, John Player. They would be interested to hear the final policy of the Labour party, as it now stands.

Mr. Cook: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will take every opportunity of reporting it to them.

Mr. Brandon-Bravo: Why not?

Mr. Cook: I did not suggest a single reason why the hon. Gentleman should not do so. I suggested that he should do so. When he does report it to the tobacco industry, I presume that it will be relaxed about the proposal as it constantly lectures us that the point of advertising tobacco products is not to persuade people to smoke but merely to persuade those who smoke to shift brands. Therefore, I cannot understand why the tobacco industry, which keeps assuring us that nobody smokes because it advertises, is the least bit worried about advertising being banned by legal prescription. That has happened in over 20 countries. One day we shall have a Government who will pluck up the courage to take legal action to ensure that the tobacco industry has to advertise within the law and not within a voluntary agreement. To that extent, I am disappointed that the Government propose to implement this directive purely by voluntary agreement. If they do so, they will be throwing away what could possibly be the greater gain from this directive.

Mr. Jonathan Aitken: I beg to move, at end of the Question to add
?but expresses concern at the extent to which the Commission is presenting directives under article 100A when the issues involved fall more appropriately under other articles of the Treaty; and calls upon Her Majesty's Government to raise the issue of the Treaty Clause base at the Council of Ministers before discussions proceed on the merits of the proposed directive.'.
The amendment raises a small but nevertheless crucial constitutional point about what I believe to be the manifest impropriety in the method that the European Commission has used to bring in this proposed directive on the labelling of tobacco products with their tar content.

As the amendment states, and as my hon. Friend the Minister has made clear, the legal basis for these directives is article 100A of the Single European Act's addition to the treaty of Rome.
My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary was tremendously candid with the House. She made it clear that these directives were being introduced basically for preventive health reasons and, as an ardent non-smoker, I am sympathetic to what the Commission is seeking to achieve and my hon. Friend's endorsement of it. I recognise that others may wish to quarrel with the substance and content of the directives. There are many cheerfully heavy smokers in the House and many with views like those of Lord Skelmersdale.

Mrs. Currie: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way to me as I recognise that, with the leave of the House, I shall have an opportunity to respond later. However, I should not wish my hon. Friend to besmirch my perfect reputation. I said that the Commission said that these directives are part of the liberalisation of the internal market for 1992. I shall come back to that point later. It is not our view that they are being introduced for preventive health measures. There are on the horizon other directives under the "Europe Against Cancer" programme which are under different articles and which will possibly be debated in the House in due course.

Mr. Aitken: Far be it for me to besmirch my hon. Friend's reputation. I know when I am on a loser. However, in all seriousness, I find a certain Dispatch Box schizophrenia in what she said. I am not sure whether my hon. Friend thinks that she is speaking for the European Commission or for the Government. When she spoke for the Government, the major part of her speech seemed to be directed to the health reasons for backing these directives. Leaving aside the legal niceties and the requirement to be polite to the European Commission, I feel that the whole thrust of these directives must be that they are being introduced in the spirit of Euro-nanny knowing what is best.
That is the drive of these directives. We do not need to quarrel about whether we are for or against the content of the directives. I have tabled the amendment on the basis that it is crystal clear and a matter of common sense that we are seeking to introduce some good, preventive health engineering. My hon. Friend the Minister is quite right. That is not what the European Commission would like us to believe.
The clock struck 13 for me when I read the opening line of the directive which states that the elimination of all trade barriers by 1992 requires the harmonisation of national provisions governing the labelling of tobacco products. We should ask why that is the case. In considering the need for harmonisation across European Community trade barriers, the last thing we need to worry about is what labels are on tobacco cartons. Some of the explanatory memoranda make it clear that virtually all the European nations give some kind of health warning on cigarette packets. What appears to be at issue is the precise wording, whether we are being warned against bronchial—cum—cardiovascular diseases or fatal disease or whether smoking is simply bad for our health.
All that needs to be harmonised is the degree of verbal warning, not the fact that there is a message on the cigarette packet. It is nonsense to suggest that it is a


requirement of the internal market to harmonise health warnings. It reminds me of the famous remark by the late governor Al Smith of New York who said, "However thin you slice it, it's still baloney." It is baloney that the Common Market Commission needs to gear up to harmonise the precise words.
Why do I take the trouble to labour the point at this late hour? I believe that the truth content of the opening words of the directive, like the tar content, is about 15 per cent. The other 85 per cent. of the truth content is that health is the issue here. In the polite language of the Select Committee on European Legislation, the directive comprises
measures whose prime objectives appear difficult to reconcile with the establishment or functioning of the internal market.
We cannot find a more civil way of putting across the message that I was putting forward in rather blunt terms.
In the manipulation of the legal basis of the directive lies the dangerous thin end of the wedge in constitutional terms. As we contemplate a wide spectrum of directives, we realise that article 100A is a convenient vehicle for the social engineering ambitions of Mr. Jacques Delors and his Commission. Directives brought in under article 100A require majority voting. I cannot put it any better than in the language of Mr. Speaker's counsel. I quote from his observations on the directive in which he said:
A particular danger is that areas of competence may pass to the Community undetected or at any rate unchallenged on the coat-tails of the internal market element in Commission proposals. This would be an unexpected result if one sees Article 100A as being concerned not with competence but with unblocking the decision-taking process in a particular area already well founded in the Treaty.
Mr. Speaker's counsel has put the case admirably. We, as a House of Commons, should not just let go, without comment, the fact that the legal basis of the directive is constitutionally unsound. The Government's legal advisers, particularly the Cabinet Office legal team which is supposed to fight such battles in the preliminary stages at Brussels, should have done their job much more thoroughly. They were asleep at the switch. Perhaps my hon. Friend the Minister will tell us later whether Lord Skelmersdale raised this point at the Council of Ministers when he spoke on the issue in the early stages. Did he make an effort to insist in the early stages that the directive should have been introduced under a different article of the treaty?
I was impressed by the response of my hon. Friend the Minister: "We have, we shall and we do," suggesting that she was almost enthusiastic about the amendment. However, a moment or two later she skated off on a different and less solid piece of ice and seemed to urge us not to press the proposal. She seemed unwilling to accept it because she said that the Government must preserve their position our of courtesy to the European Commission. I should have expected my hon. Friend of all people to take a slightly more robust approach. She is not afraid to state her position clearly and tread on a few toes from time to time. Surely we do not need to be so elaborately courteous that we do not dare state the British Government's position on a matter of such fundamental constitutional importance.

Mr. Spearing: I had an exchange with the Minister on that very point. Is the hon. Gentleman aware that there is

a possible explanation for the schizophrenia to which he referred? According to my information, if a treaty basis is to be challenged, it must be challenged on introduction and by practice and an effective reversal of that basis must be by unanimous decision. Is it not possible that the Government apprehended that that might be impossible and therefore remained silent and will continue to do so despite what the Minister said? Perhaps that is the reason for her unwillingness to accept the amendment.

Mr. Aitken: Perhaps my hon. Friend will respond to that herself.
My hon. Friends and I wanted to put down an important constitutional marker. I would not wish to spoil the directive on this issue, and that is in no way the point of this exercise. However, if we do not protest at this thin edge of the wedge, article 100A will be used in much more sinister ways. In view of what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has said recently—in her speech in Bruges and about the social dimension of the market, which she opposes—the sooner we make our position clear the better.

Mr. Michael Knowles: My hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken) and I do not often agree about subjects relating to the Community. Generally he is regarded as an opponent and I am regarded as a supporter. Nevertheless, my hon. Friend has raised some valid points, and I should like to add to them.
Who decided that the health department in each country would be the lead department for directives concerning the tobacco industry? Let me declare my interest. I am a Nottingham Member and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, South (Mr. Brandon-Bravo) said earlier, 3,000 jobs are at stake in the city, and many more depend upon them. I make no apology to anyone for that declaration of interest. The health departments have been given the lead on a subject affecting a major industry with wide implications for employment and tax yield. If one consults any health department anywhere in the world on the subject of tobacco, one knows what the outcome will be. Quite simply, they are agin it; one can take that as read. Make them the lead department on any matter to do with tobacco and they will come up with restrictions. Rather than restrictions in one country we shall have restrictions from 12 health departments across the whole Community. That outcome was certain, but surely there were other Departments with an interest in such a major industry, such as the Department of Trade and Industry and the Treasury, which would have tax yield in mind. It would seem that their interests have not been included.
There is a problem within the Community—it is highlighted by the debate—that has been well described as the democratic deficit. We know that the Select Committee on European Legislation gets in on the act only at a late stage when proposed measures have already passed through the Council and the Commission. The European Parliament comes in on the act only at the tail end of the process. The idea of any elected assembly having any real say does not apply. Such assemblies are presented with a fait accompli at each stage. That should be of concern to us.

Mr. William Cash: My hon. Friend and I served on the Select Committee on European Legislation a few years ago, and what he has just said is frequently the reality. The Committee comes in rather late, and he will know that I was pressing for a long time that it should come in much earlier. It is possible within the Committee's terms of reference, and as a matter of procedure, for it to do so. As majority voting applies, as distinct from issues that are subject to unanimity, it would be highly desirable if we were to press effectively for early consideration of these issues.

Mr. Knowles: Absolutely. My hon. Friend and I are at one.
The Danish Parliament has probably gone too far, for its committee is over-restrictive on the Government. The French and German national Parliaments have close liaison between European members and national members and they achieve more of a balance. The United Kingdom Parliament is outstanding because as a national Parliament it gets no say whatsoever. Much is left in the hands of Government Departments. Of course, I share the faith that all of my right hon. and hon. Friends have fingertip control and are aware of everything that is going on within their Department night and day. However, there is the possibility that what we are seeing in Europe is a conspiracy of bureaucracies between the national bureaucracies in the 12 member states and the Community. At no stage does any elected assembly have any real control. That concerns me and it should concern all hon. Members. We should reinforce the powers of the Select Committee on European Legislation.
My hon. Friend the Minister is in the happy position of knowing that the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), the Opposition spokesman, was more extreme than herself. The hon. Gentleman made her appear more reasonable than perhaps she was. I can remember the halcyon days of about 10 years ago when we made speeches about the nanny state. We used to complain also about there being too much legislation. I suppose that times change. The truth is that we now see the nanny state writ large on a European scale. The irony is that without harmonised testing methods and procedures it is likely that barriers to trade could be raised by this measure, not lowered.
Despite what my hon. Friend the Minister has said about the Government continuing to press for the voluntary agreement to be recognised, I have my doubts. I fear that we shall see swept away a system of co-operation between the industry and the Government. I have no doubt that the hon. Member for Livingston would say that it would be much better to replace that system with a system of law, which would introduce much more control. I am not sure about that. When Bills pass through Parliament and become enacted we often think that they will achieve our purposes, but sometimes they do not. If there is a war between a major industry and the Government, I am not sure who will win. I would be wary of going down that path. It is easy to advocate the principle, but the outcome of a confrontation would not be certain.
The effect on the industry in Britain would be devastating, if the proposed ceiling would ban 82 per cent. of cigarettes currently manufactured in this country. That would have a massive effect on the industry.
I believe that the tar proposal in particular has just been disguised as part of the internal market so that it may be passed through the Council of Ministers on a weighted voting system. The proposal has nothing to do with internal trade, which was the point of article 100A. The article is being used for false purposes. That is wrong.
My hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken) said that items might be swept under article 100A when they should come under other articles. That means that they must be passed automatically and that opens a very wide gate. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister could repeat her Bruges speech ad infinitum. However, if that gate is opened the powers of the European Community will increase massively. There might be arguments for that, but we should debate them openly and not let matters slip through by inching the gate open steadily without debating the constitutional points.

Mr. Cash: Does my hon. Friend accept that, irrespective of what could or might happen in the Council of Ministers on this point, if there is a technical breach of the vires in that member states are not entitled to use article 100A, that could be taken to the European Court of Justice? Irrespective of the view of some people that the European Court of Justice would naturally tend to side with the Commission, that might be the right route to adopt given the considerable doubts expressed about this matter.

Mr. Knowles: I suspect that the battle has been lost. If that was to be the practice, it should have been done at the beginning when the matter first went to the Council of Ministers. I suspect that it is too late now for this directive. However, that should be the procedure for the next directive on this matter which might be slipped through.
The tar proposal is far in excess of what is necessary to permit the free movement of goods, which is the point of article 100A. We must be aware of that. If the proposal works for the 12 member states' health departments allied to people in the Commission who share their views, that route will be used for many other restrictions in other areas. We must be very careful before we go down that road without sounding a warning.

Mr. Roger Sims: In his opening comments my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, East (Mr. Knowles) said that every health department would be against the use of tobacco. He said that in terms which suggested that they were all part of some sinister plot. However, he is absolutely right, and every health department will be against tobacco.
I want to repeat two propositions that I have uttered in the House before, and I do not apologise for doing so. First, smoking is the largest avoidable cause of death in this country. Secondly, 100,000 people per annum die prematurely from smoking, and thousands suffer painful illnesses and diseases because they smoke.
The House will be aware that I am chairman of the all-party group ASH—Action on Smoking and Health. Hon. Members may also be aware that the group's vice chairman is the hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes). That shows that the group covers a pretty wide spectrum in the House.
Members of ASH are subject to frequent criticism from an organisation called FOREST—Freedom Organisation


for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco—which, alas, often demonstrates qualities of intolerance and bigotry which it ascribes to us. FOREST claims to promote the interests of freedom, but it is of course a body financially supported by the tobacco industry. We are neither intolerant nor bigoted. If a man or woman wishes to smoke, that is his or her free choice. However, we claim the freedom for the non-smoker not to have to breathe other people's smoke.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I draw to the hon. Gentleman's attention the specific proposals that are before the House, to which he is not addressing himself.

Mr. Sims: I am obliged to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and in view of your ruling I shall not pursue that point.
I was trying to indicate the areas of criticism made by FOREST. Another takes the form of an implication that there is something unreasonable or improper about a number of the cases made by ASH. We argue that because of the overwhelming evidence of the harm done by smoking there is a heavy responsibility on the Government to reduce the health risks of smoking, to persuade smokers to smoke less or to stop, and to dissuade young people from starting to smoke.
The two draft directives before the House are both useful steps in that direction. There is clear evidence of the relationship between the quantity of tar in cigarettes and the cancer risk. In recent years the level has been reduced from 30 mg to 15 mg, so a further reduction to 12 mg by 1995 should not be difficult to achieve. It will at least offer a modest reduction in the health risk, so I strongly support that directive.
The other draft directive is on the labelling of tobacco products. As my hon. Friend the Minister said, that is nothing new, because tobacco products have carried health warnings for several years, on the smaller sides of cigarette packets. They include the words:
Smoking can cause fatal diseases,
Smoking can cause heart disease,
and
Smoking can cause lung cancer.
Right hon. and hon. Members will note the element of doubt, with the use of the word "can". The fact remains, as was said by the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), that smoking does cause cancer and other diseases.
In 1985 the Health Education Council undertook research which clearly showed that, to be effective, cigarette packet warnings needed to be more prominent and strongly worded. The draft directive achieves both those aims. It requires that health warnings appear on both the larger sides of cigarette packets, and it details a series of strongly-worded warnings. The extent to which a country adopts them is optional. I hope that our country will use them all, because frequent changes of wording are more likely to attract attention. That proposal also has my support, because anything that brings home the danger to smokers, and especially to potential smokers, must be beneficial.
The draft directives refer to tobacco products, not simply to cigarettes. As I understand my hon. Friend, they will also cover cigars, cigarillos, and pipe tobaccos. When my hon. Friend replies to the debate, perhaps she will also indicate whether the directives will cover Skoal Bandits, which are the oral tobacco pouches, with which some right

hon. and hon. Members may be familiar. Whether or not they do is academic, because I understand that the Government intend prohibiting Skoal Bandits altogether, although as yet we see no signs of their bringing such a measure into effect. Perhaps my hon. Friend will indicate what is happening on that front.
It is the Commission's intention that the draft directives shall be translated into legislation. My hon. Friend has indicated that, hitherto, the Government have favoured voluntary arrangements and prefer to continue on that course. I join the hon. Member for Livingston in urging the Government to think again. Voluntary agreements are inevitably a compromise. They do not go as far as the Department of Health would want and, by their nature, they cannot be enforced. Compliance with the directives would not, I understand, involve complex legislation. We could comply with the directives simply by orders under the Consumer Protection Act 1987, and I suggest that that would be an appropriate course to follow.
The purpose of the legislation is harmonisation. There is one other matter of great concern on which my hon. Friend touched—the suggestion that member states may not prohibit or restrict the sale of products when they are conforming to those directives. That conflicts with our law prohibiting the sale of cigarette products to the under-16s. Research shows that, in the I 1 to 15 age group, 12 per cent. of girls and 7 per cent. of boys smoke regularly. In the 15 to 16 age group, the figures rise to 27 per cent. of girls and 18 per cent. of boys. Half the adult smokers started smoking as children, so it is vital that, far from our powers to restrict sales to under-16s being reduced, they should be strengthened.
I accept that the Commission is aware of this problem, but I put it to my hon. Friend that it must be a condition of our accepting these directives that that point is adequately dealt with. Of course, there has been opposition from the tobacco industry to these directives, perhaps not surprisingly, and no doubt we shall hear more. I have carefully read the submission by the Tobacco Advisory Council and its European counterparts. I find their case unconvincing and very much a matter of special pleading. To draw a parallel between requiring lower tar yields and the complete prohibition of alcohol in the United States is stretching logical argument beyond reason. Nor does a plea that printing health warnings on the front of the packet would depreciate the commercial and legal value of the trade mark carry much weight.
I hope that the House will support the motion. I urge the Government to support and implement the directives as soon as practicable.

Mr. Martin M. Brandon-Bravo: I do not smoke, but, to abuse that famous saying, I shall defend my constituents' right to do so. I want to defend more than just my constituents. I refer to an intervention that I made earlier, and to comments by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, East (Mr. Knowles), that the six or seven constituencies that make up greater Nottingham contain the homes of about 3,000 people who are directly employed in the tobacco industry by probably the country's most famous tobacco manufacturer, John Player. It is my duty, if nothing else, to represent the interests not just of those who are still working for John Player but of the many thousands of its pensioners who


have benefited from that company's commercial activities over many years. Their case is entitled to be heard in the House.
I concede that the aims of the motion are much in line with current thinking, but, as has been mentioned by a number of colleagues, I am disturbed at the route that the EEC has taken. I welcome the comments of my hon. Friend the Minister and hope that something can be done to bring to the EEC some of the depth of feeling on this topic. As my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken) said, it is difficult to link article 100A with the functioning of an internal market. By a stretch of the imagination, I suppose that one can, but if we do not stamp on it now I do not think that we shall ever be able to do so.
We are asked to look at this proposal in the context of the single market in 1992. We are also asked to believe that it is designed to ensure the free circulation of tobacco products and to take into account health considerations. I cannot look at it in that light. I am also puzzled by the insistence on packaging being printed in the language that is used at the point of sale. That will make life even more difficult. It will result in a restriction on the circulation of goods.
We are told that the elimination of all trade barriers by 1992 requires the harmonisation of all national provisions that govern the labelling of tobacco products. I am not against the adoption of a common approach to health warnings, but it is a pity that companies with traditional packaging or world-famous logos should be told by the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) that warnings round the sides of the packs are not enough—that people are so stupid that, unless the warnings are plastered across the front of every pack, they will be unable to read them. That is stretching the point much too far. I believe that the black and gold pack of John Player and the blue pack of the French Gauloises are traditional to those companies. I see no reason why they should be forced to change their packs because they have to be plastered with health warnings 50 times over.
I do not believe that the tar proposals should be part of the integrated market programme. I do not like the way in which that proposal is being handled by the Council of Ministers. If we accept the proposed ceilings, 82 per cent. of all our brands will have to go off the market. Customer choice may change over time and the industry may be able to adjust to that change, but the fact is that a staggering 82 per cent. of all our brands would have to come off the shelves if the proposal were to be applied quickly. Even if the ceilings were agreed, it is just possible that, without harmonised testing methods and procedures, barriers to trade would be created.
I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to ensure that in the right quarters our approach to the tax proposals is handled much more carefully. I should hate the tax proposals to be slipped in by the Commissioners by means of another article that did not allow the House to exercise the sovereignty over taxation that hitherto we have taken for granted.

Mr. Ian Taylor: Does my hon. Friend agree that a directive of this kind means that the value of harmonising trade throughout the European Community has been hijacked, in this case by the anti-smoking lobby? Does he also agree that those who want the market to be opened up are very concerned that the Commission may

introduce other measures, under which the proponents of the social dimension will try to hijack measures that are designed to open up the market? It is the confusion between the two objectives—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. We are discussing the labelling of tobacco products and the tar yield of cigarettes.

Mr. Brandon-Bravo: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The proposed labelling and all it stands for is part of what has correctly been described as a manifestation not of the nanny state but of the nanny continent.
Even the industry does not try to kid anybody that tobacco is good for one's health, but I hope that the taxation arrangements will be much more specific than ad valorem. If we tax ad valorem, we shall merely reduce the number of cigarettes made in Britain. There will be very little reduction in the number of cigarettes smoked. All that will happen is that we shall import cheap, subsidised tobacco from a variety—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will bear in mind what I have just said. We are discussing the labelling of tobacco products and the tar yield of cigarettes, not taxation.

Mr. Brandon-Bravo: I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but we are trying to illustrate that the article that we are discussing is one of the danger points. We are anxious that if labelling comes in under this article, so might taxation. That is a matter of real concern—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: We are not discussing an article. We are discussing two draft directives with specific intentions, to which I have referred. I hope that the House will direct its remarks to them.

Mr. Brandon-Bravo: The Commission seems to be trying to extend its powers in this area of public health by engineering the sole right to amend enacted legislation without reference to national Parliaments.
I am not quite sure how the Greeks will react to this one. During the recess, I had a very happy week going through Salonika where a lot of tobacco is grown. There are no health warnings on Greek cigarettes and 70 per cent. of the male population smokes its head off, but, believe it or not, Greece has the lowest incidence of lung cancer in Europe.

Mrs. Currie: rose—

Mr. Brandon-Bravo: I offer that only as a piece of gratuituous information which I knew would produce a response.

Mrs. Currie: I am sure that my hon. Friend would not wish anybody to think that lung cancer develops quickly after the smoking rate rises. In Britain we have found that as smoking has dropped, and particularly as the tar yield of cigarettes smoked has dropped, it has taken 10 to 15 years for falls to be shown in mortality from lung cancer.

Mr. Brandon-Bravo: I am not disputing my hon. Friend's figures. I am simply saying that the Greeks have probably been smoking for as long as people in Britain. There seems to be a strange quirk of reality. Some 70 per cent. of Greek adult males smoke, but they have the lowest incidence of lung cancer in Europe. Even worse is the fact


that they smoke tobacco with a much higher tar yield than do the British. That may not fit the received wisdom of the Minister, but it is the reality.
We understand that tobacco is not good for health. We are not trying to push smoking. We are simply trying to ensure that, if people wish to smoke, they understand the risks. The House should recognise that many thousands of people depend, directly or indirectly, on this industry for their jobs and their livelihoods. We should not lightly set their interests to one side.

Sir Trevor Skeet: I listened attentively to my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken). His argument was very sound.
A convenient instrument—article 100A—has been selected. It was calculated initially to harmonise national law to remove obstacles to free trade. The Community's proposals for ensuring the free movement of goods are excessive. Indeed, they would disrupt trade, industry and competition.
The EEC grows approximately 350,000 tonnes of tobacco in some 250,000 farms, which are largely in the poorer countries of the Mediterranean. The tobacco is low in nicotine and unsuited to the manufacture of low-tar cigarettes. Much of the current crop would be unsaleable by 1991. The countries concerned are Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal.
Are we to contemplate that the purpose of article 100A is deliberately to thrust people into unemployment? That is not the way to enlarge trade—it will constrict trade, and I do not believe that that was the aim. The Commission had health considerations in mind and proposed to use them as a convenient method to achieve the inevitable result of the majority vote, as has already been said.
My hon. Friend the Minister has said that there is no such thing as a safe cigarette. I dare say that we shall hear from the Opposition that one cigarette will cause death. I do not accept that view. My view is that we should be careful not to lay down maxims, but to do nothing to excess is a reasonable view of life.
As for the draft directive on labelling, 90 per cent. of people recognise the health warning. It cannot be brought to their attention any more clearly. I do not consider that it would be any more significant if it were printed on two or three sides of the carton or if the trade mark were eliminated. The method of smoking is also relevant. If people puff harder, they will get more tar in their lungs. If they smoke lightly, they will be less affected.
Therefore, the battle is not quite as easy as the Minister says. However, I shall support her in one respect. It has been traditional in the United Kingdom to carry out consultation with the industry and that has been very successful. I am not sure that I accept the Minister's figures, so I shall provide my own. The average tar yield of cigarettes has dropped from 22·5 mg per cigarette in 1970 to 13 mg per cigarette in 1987—a reduction of about 40 per cent. in 16 years. That was achieved without legislation through a voluntary arrangement with the industry concerned, with the minimum disruption and without the prohibition of any brand of cigarettes. That is what can be achieved.
Apparently the Opposition are saying that we should have legislation and that everyone should be bound by it. It has been said tonight that, if we were to impose a level of 12 mg by 1995, 80 per cent. of cigarettes in the United Kingdom would be unsaleable, as would 83 per cent. of those in the European Community. I am not certain whether my hon. Friend the Minister would agree with the figures that I have given, but they are the industry's figures. I think that some of the figures that she cited were very much lower. However, that would lead to a massive disruption and loss of employment which we do not wish to see in the United Kingdom.
I shall make only one other point as I do not wish to take up too much of the time of the House. I mentioned

that the method of smoking is significant, but for the growers in the United Kingdom and elsewhere I must pray in aid the fact that a marked change must be phased in. Blending tobacco is extremely difficult unless there is the correct leaf and would have to be secured from abroad and that could lead to considerable difficulties during the next two or three years.

Mr. Barry Field: I have to declare an interest in the matter because my father gained passing notoriety when he successfully saw off a robust bid for the family company by a tobacco company and as a result a poem was published in the Financial Times which lampooned the fact that the tobacco company had gained control of and owned Golders Green crematorium. The late Jimmy Hanley used to say that the only sign of life was the smoke coming from the crematorium chimney. Lest hon. Members feel that I approach the subject with too much flippancy, I should say that my family has done a considerable amount for research at the Royal Marsden hospital and was active in the early days in furthering Dame Cicely Saunders in the hospice movement.
Article 2 of the proposed directive defines tobacco products as
products for the purpose of smoking, sniffing, sucking or chewing inasmuch as they are, even partly, made of tobacco".
Can my hon. Friend the Minister tell me who will decide which is the front and which is the back of a bar of chewing tobacco so that the health warning may be printed upon it?
The question that I should like to ask my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) involves the "sniffing" mentioned in article 2. The House of Commons Public Information Office circular No. 52 states:
Another curious survival of the eighteenth century is the provision of snuff, in recent years at public expense"—
I stress, "at public expense"—
for Members and Officers of the House, at the doorkeepers' box at the entrance to the Chamber. A few still avail themselves of the facility. Snuff, however, is the only form of tobacco the use of which is tolerated in or around the Chamber: smoking has been banned there and in committees since 1693.
I learn from the book, "The Great Palace", that the snuff provided is contained in a box made of oak
saved from the bombed Chamber after the last war, and it contains a blend of snuff milled especially for the Commons. On top of the box there is a silver plaque which lists the names of the Principal Doorkeepers who have guarded the Chamber door.
Our Principal Doorkeeper, like all our Doorkeepers, had considerable and distinguished service in Her Majesty's armed forces. One wonders whether, on his front and back, he will require a health warning of the dimensions laid out in the proposal directive.
I should like my hon. Friend the Minister to direct her attention to the fact that the hypocrisy of the House is yet again evident. It is a case not of do as I do but do as I say. The hon. Member for Livingston made it clear that the Labour party wants to see action on the health hazard, yet we have a tobacco product provided for all hon. Members at the taxpayers' expense.
Apart from motorists in Britain, I know of no other groups who are now as persecuted as smokers. In the past few weeks we have heard much about pensioners, and to


many of them their bit of tobacco, their puff and their pint of beer is the comfort to which they look forward in their twilight years.
The objective of the directive is said to be to achieve greater protection of the individual. Nowhere can we see the ghost of Jacques Delors more clearly printed than in that phrase. Conservative Members believe that the protection of the individual is in his own destiny and choice, not in EEC directives.

Mr. Richard Alexander: I shall be brief, as my hon. Friends the Members for Nottingham, South (Mr. Brandon-Bravo) and for Nottingham, East (Mr. Knowles) have covered the points that I would otherwise have covered at greater length. This matter is of concern to Nottinghamshire and to those employed in the tobacco industry.
I am sorry that the debate has, perhaps understandably, been bedevilled by hostility to the tobacco industry. If we are to say that tobacco has some of the evil effects described by hon. Members, we should debate it openly and thoroughly. If we are to ban tobacco, we should say so, not try to strangle it by the back door through a European proposal disguised as trade harmonisation. We should do one or the other.
There has been co-operation between the industry and the Government through the voluntary agreement, which has worked. The tar level has dropped from 22·5 mg to 13 mg per cigarette. If the proposal comes into force, all that good will will be dissipated. People will feel aggrieved, especially those in the industry who have co-operated. It will put paid to co-operation completely.
Some people want to go further down the health warning route. These proposals certainly do. I share the doubt that has been expressed by some of my hon. Friends about the effectiveness of the health warnings. I am not a smoker of cigarettes, but I have always found that those who are ignore the health warnings when deciding whether to buy another packet or to have another cigarette. The proposed directive will have no greater effect, but at the same time it will be a further brake on the industry's competitiveness and its ability to trade as it best knows how and legally.
If the EC believes that warnings are effective, why do we need a dual system? Why clutter cigarette packets with a load of information that no one will bother to read? It will be difficult to do so, be it on the back or the front, through the various trade marks or logos. I do not think that a proliferation of print will do anything other than restrict the tobacco industry in the sale of its products in a lawful manner.
Even if the amendment does not appeal to my hon. Friend the Minister, I hope that the way in which it is proposed will. I am a signatory to the amendment moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken). If we are to restrict the sale of tobacco, we should do so in a sensible and correct way. I object to the proposals if the Commission will be able further to restrict tar yields or labelling without reference to Ministers. Civil servants restricting trade without reference to Parliament or Ministers is completely unacceptable.
Even if my hon. Friend the Minister disagrees with my views on the tobacco industry, I hope that she will share the widespread concern of hon. Members about the way in which it will be done.

Mr. Teddy Taylor: It is a pleasure to have the opportunity to speak on some of these important measures.
I hope that before a decision is made by the Council of Ministers the Minister will answer two important questions. First, what will be the cost to the EEC of making alternative provision for the massive European tobacco industry?
As the Minister knows, the European tobacco industry is the third largest producer of tobacco in the world. There are no fewer than 250,000 producers. They operate mainly in the southern parts of Europe, but there are also a few in the United Kingdom. Sadly, these producers make a kind of tobacco that is difficult, even over a period of years, to change to the proposed acutely low levels of tar. The industry will need an alternative system of support. Bearing in mind the astonishing bills that the EEC has landed us with, due to the common agricultural policy and the protection of agriculture that that entails, and that these producers have limited incomes, we need to know the cost of such alternative provision.
Secondly, will the Minister inquire to what extent the directives can fit in with free trade? The only conceivable connection is that Belgium, with three languages, will be put at a significant trade disadvantage because if the warnings are printed in three languagues on the packet there will be no room left on it to describe the contents. Is not that being unfair to Belgium?
I hope that the Minister appreciates the importance of the amendment. I hope that she has noticed that it is supported by my hon. Friend the Member for Esher (Mr. Taylor), among others. He is an acknowledged enthusiast for almost every part of the EEC, but not for administrative nonsense. Under the Single European Act we gave the EEC additional powers that enable it to take decisions by majority vote. We decided on the category of things that should be so decided.
When the Commission, as my hon. Friends the Members for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken) and for Esher and the Select Committee have said, goes beyond that category, it is reasonable that the Government should express their concern about such abuse. We fully appreciate that the Government can probably do nothing; even if they protest, it would need a unanimous Council decision to change from article 100A to the appropriate article. Nothing may be achieved by protest, but when powers are being abused, as almost all hon. Members in the debate have agreed they are, the least the Government can do is to express their displeasure and tell the Commission that it is doing something wrong. That might influence the Commission's future actions.
We know that Parliament does not consider these things. We decide nothing about the subjects that fall within the famous 80 per cent. sovereignty category. Even the Government do not decide most of these things. Measures can be enforced on us by majority vote. On the other hand, if the Commission goes beyond the powers granted by the Single European Act, we have the right to


complain. I hope that the Minister, who is noted for her independence and vigour, will tell the Council at the meeting that it is in error, and ask it not to do this again.

Mrs. Currie: This has been an extremely useful take-note debate. We have heard a large number of pertinent speeches. I was distressed to hear that my colleagues feel that the Department of Health should not take the lead. I am speaking for the United Kingdom Government, and lines are cleared with our colleagues in the Department of Trade and Industry, the Treasury and other Departments before and during negotiations. I am not speaking only for myself.
Perhaps I should clear up the important question of how much snuff costs in the House. The hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) tabled a question about that to my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council on Monday 7 November and was answered as follows:
The average annual consumption of snuff provided by the Principal Doorkeeper is some 1½ oz. I understand that only one hon. Member regularly takes advantage of this service. The average annual cost to public funds is 99p."—[Official Report, 7 November 1988; Vol. 140, c 93.]
My hon. Friends have expressed concern about several issues. I shall try to deal with them quickly, recognising that debates on other draft directives are to follow.
Broadly speaking, my hon. Friends have dealt with three main topics. My hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) asked whether we should have majority voting, a point hinted at by one or two other hon. Members. That was dealt with in the debates on the Single European Act, which was passed with a large majority. On Second Reading the majority was 159, and the United Kingdom has been a major force in negotiations to make progress on the Single European Act using majority rule. Since 1985, more than 200 measures have been agreed, including 60 this year alone—many under the qualified majority rule—and that has had a catalytic effect on increasing the pace towards 1992. That may be one reason why my hon. Friend does not like it. I recognise the sincerity of the views that he and some of my hon. Friends expressed on that.
The second question is whether we should deal with tobacco as part of the move towards 1992. It is a legal product and a traded commodity, like many others. The trade runs into many millions of pounds. Others may not see the argument for excluding tobacco from our discussions. Labelling and product content are important matters that have been discussed in connection with many other legally traded products—for example, in the food directives, the labelling of cosmetics and the product content of pharmaceuticals. As long as a product is traded, as tobacco is—it is a legal product, and we have no plans to change its status—it is likely to be scrutinised by those concerned with trade. There are trade elements in the directive, so there are grounds for using article 100A.
I apologise to my hon. Friends if that sounds like casuistry, but labelling is different in various countries, and that might be a barrier to trade. Therefore it is appropriate that some discussion should take place on the basis of this article.
We may need to separate in our own minds the Commission's proposals on a traded product from our worries about tobacco as such. I recognise the interests of

constituents that have been expressed by several hon. Members. They are honourable concerns, and hon. Members are doing their jobs as constituency Members well. I also recognise the concern that has been expressed about the nation's health and about some of the other claims made about the nation's health, which are not always well supported. We share those concerns. We already have means of dealing with them.
As for Greece, it is for the Greeks to decide their attitude to the directives. As to what my noble Friend Lord Skelmersdale said at the Council of Ministers, I understand that he did not mention the treaty base, but that he did use the words quoted by the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), and therefore left no one in any doubt where he stood.
My hon. Friend the Member for Chislehurst (Mr. Sims) asked whether the directive would cover Skoal Bandits. The answer is yes. He asked where we stand on the proposals on Skoal Bandits. Representations are still under consideration.
I have some sympathy with the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, South (Mr. Aitken), which were echoed by some of my colleagues. We do not believe in harmonisation for the sake of it. We need to be convinced that the directive will remove barriers to trade, not erect them. The directive should have trade as its objective, as long as it is part of the moves towards 1992—and little else. The primary purpose of these objectives is trade, but it is permissible under the treaty for health to be a subsidiary purpose, and when it is, paragraph (3) of article 100A is relevant. That is the "best practice" paragraph.
The Commission is considering other directives and documents on tobacco which come under other articles. Smoking in public places and the protection of children from tobacco will come in under article 235; broadcasting under articles 57 and 66; and tax harmonisation under article 99. A preliminary draft for a Commission-proposed directive on tobacco advertising has just been received. It is not yet known what the draft contains, nor under which article of the EC treaty the directive will be proposed. As for tax harmonisation, the directive was passed in 1977, but unanimity is required. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer have said publicly that deregulation, not approximation, is necessary for the completion of the single European market.
The third question that has been well aired tonight is whether we should use voluntary agreements instead of legislation. The United Kingdom has always been pragmatic on this matter. Our approach has been a mixture of legislation and voluntary action, and legislation on the subject goes back more than 50 years to the Public Service Vehicles (Conduct of Drivers, Conductors and Passengers) Regulations 1936. The most recent legislation was the Protection of Children (Tobacco) Act 1986.
This morning I saw Professor Sir Peter Froggatt of Belfast university, who is the chairman of the independent scientific committee on smoking and health, which was set up to advise the Government on a variety of issues relating to smoking and tobacco. He expressed his concern about the sales-weighted average tar yield agreement, which is now faced with some problems. He said that he wanted us to put it on record that he felt that SWAT, which cannot be enforced, is useful, and we should do what we can to keep it. Therefore, we continue to take a pragmatic view on this. 
I have given some thought to the approach that we ought to adopt to the amendment, especially as it has been tabled by hon. Friends. However, it is much too sweeping in its general criticism of the Commission. As I said, had they done us the courtesy of asking us for our views before they tabled the amendment, they would have found that we had some sympathy with their points. I have had no letters or parliamentary questions from any of my seven hon. Friends who tabled the amendment, on tobacco products or on policy. They have not asked to meet me, although we are always happy to meet colleagues. Had they done so, they might have rewritten their speeches and the amendment in such a way that I would feel passionate about accepting it. In the circumstances, although we do not dissent from the concerns expressed, we cannot accept the amendment.

Mr. Aitken: I am disappointed by the response of my hon. Friend the Minister. I did not expect to get a ticking off. I am mindful of the fact that this is a House of Commons occasion, because views firmly in favour of the amendment have been expressed from both sides of the House. My hon. Friend has not produced a convincing answer, so I shall press my amendment to a Division.

Question put, That the amendment be made:—

The House divided, Ayes 11, Noes 82.

Division No. 496]
[10.56 pm


AYES


Barnes, Harry (Derbyshire NE)
Pike, Peter L.


Bermingham, Gerald
Skinner, Dennis


Buckley, George J.
Spearing, Nigel


Crowther, Stan



Cryer, Bob
Tellers for the Ayes:


Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S W)
Mr. Teddy Taylor and


Meale, Alan
Mr. Jonathan Aitken.


Patchett, Terry





NOES


Alexander, Richard
Baker, Nicholas (Dorset N)


Amess, David
Bennett, Nicholas (Pembroke)


Arbuthnot, James
Bevan, David Gilroy


Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)
Boswell, Tim


Ashdown, Paddy
Bottomley, Peter





Bottomley, Mrs Virginia
Janman, Tim


Bowis, John
Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)


Brandon-Bravo, Martin
Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine


Brazier, Julian
King, Roger (B'ham N'thfield)


Brown, Michael (Brigg &amp; Cl't's)
Kirkwood, Archy


Burns, Simon
Knapman, Roger


Butterfill, John
Knowles, Michael


Carrington, Matthew
Knox, David


Chapman, Sydney
Lawrence, Ivan


Coombs, Anthony (Wyre F'rest)
Lightbown, David


Coombs, Simon (Swindon)
Lord, Michael


Cope, Rt Hon John
Mans, Keith


Cran, James
Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)


Currie, Mrs Edwina
Neubert, Michael


Davis, David (Boothferry)
Page, Richard


Day, Stephen
Paice, James


Dorrell, Stephen
Raffan, Keith


Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James
Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)


Dunn, Bob
Sims, Roger


Durant, Tony
Stanbrook, Ivor


Dykes, Hugh
Steel, Rt Hon David


Fallon, Michael
Stewart, Allan (Eastwood)


Favell, Tony
Summerson, Hugo


Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)
Taylor, Ian (Esher)


Fookes, Miss Janet
Taylor, John M (Solihull)


French, Douglas
Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)


Gale, Roger
Thurnham, Peter


Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles
Townend, John (Bridlington)


Gregory, Conal
Waddington, Rt Hon David


Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth N)
Walden, George


Hamilton, Hon Archie (Epsom)
Wallace, James


Harris, David
Warren, Kenneth


Heathcoat-Amory, David
Widdecombe, Ann


Hind, Kenneth
Wood, Timothy


Howarth, Alan (Strat'd-on-A)



Hunt, David (Wirral W)
Tellers for the Noes:


Irvine, Michael
Mr. Kenneth Carlisle and


Jack, Michael
Mr. David Maclean.

Question accordingly negatived.

Main Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 4192/88 on the labelling of tobacco products and the Supplementary Explanatory Memorandum submitted by the Department of Health on 7th November 1988 and 4193/88 on tar yields of cigarettes; welcomes continued progress towards removing the remaining barriers to trade between Member States; and, in the interests of public health, endorses the aims of reducing the tar yield of cigarettes and of ensuring that Community consumers are adequately warned of the dangers of smoking.

Titanium Dioxide

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mrs. Virginia Bottomley): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos. 6387/83 and 7733/84 and the Supplementary Explanatory Memoranda submitted by the Department of the Environment on 14th June and 22nd July 1988 on waste from the titanium dioxide industry; and supports the Government's intention to seek to ensure that the provisions of any new directive should take full account both of the need to protect the environment and of the need to ensure that the interests of the United Kingdom's titanium dioxide producers are safeguarded.
I welcome the opportunity to discuss tonight an important proposal for European Community legislation. The proposal is significant both in terms of securing a considerable degree of environmental improvement, albeit localised, in several areas of the European Community, and in terms of its potential impact on an important industry.
The debate concerns the titanium dioxide industry and the industrial pollutants that it produces. It is about the way in which the Government are dealing with the issue in relation both to the directives in place and proposed by the European Commission, and within the context of our own policies for strengthening the environmental protection of our rivers and estuaries.
Titanium dioxide is the main source of pigments used in paints and in a number of other products, such as ceramics. We have just three titanium dioxide factories in the United Kingdom, one of which is modern and gives rise to no significant pollution. That is the Tioxide UK Ltd. plant on Teesside, which uses the chloride process. Of more concern, because they are older, are the Tioxide UK Ltd. plant on Humberside, and the SCM Chemicals Ltd. plant, also on Humberside. I welcome Humberside Members to the debate. They have been active in advancing their constituents' views on this important matter.
There are two main production processes. The older and more polluting process is the sulphate method, which produces large amounts of iron sulphate and sulphuric acid. This is the process which is used by Tioxide on Humberside and one of the two processes used by SCM. The newer, less polluting process—the chloride method—is also used by SCM and by Tioxide at its Teesside factory. It results in the production of waste metal chlorides which can either be discharged to water or dumped on land.
Concern about the polluting impact of the discharges from the industry derives not so much from the nature of the substances—they are not on our "red list" or the Community's list I or list II of dangerous substances, the black or grey lists—as from the sheer volume of waste produced. Indeed, it was originally the impact of the wastes discharged by the Italian industry—notably, the so-called red mud—which led to proprosals for a Community directive for this industry in the 1970s.
The background to the proposal from the Commisssion of the European Communities for a directive on procedures for harmonising the pollution reduction programmes caused by waste from the titanium dioxide industry lies in an earlier directive. The existing directive on waste from the titanium dioxide industry was adopted in 1978. This has as its stated aim the prevention and

progressive reduction of pollution caused by waste from the industry. It lays down general rules for the disposal of the different kinds of waste.
Articcle 9 of that directive requires member states to draw up programmes for the progressive reduction and eventual elimination of pollution caused by waste from existing industrial establishments. The article also provides for the Commission to submit proposals to the Council for the harmonisation of member states' programmes. The proposal for such a harmonisation directive is what we are debating today.
Traditionally, our approach to controlling discharges to the aquatic environment has been through environmental quality objectives and standards, having regard to the ability of receiving waters to accept discharges without detriment to the specified uses for those waters. This approach has served us well. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment described in the House recently, we have achieved major clean-ups of our estuaries over the past 20 years through this approach, and it is now the Rhine—certainly not the Thames—which is the dirty river of Europe. Indeed, the quality of both our rivers and estuaries compares very favourably with the quality of those in the rest of the European Community. Over 90 per cent. of our rivers are of good or fair quality, which means that they are suitable for drinking water extraction, support at least good coarse fisheries and have some amenity value.

Mr. Allan Roberts: The Minister is saying that the way to deal with the pollution is to put the waste out to sea rather than into estuaries. In the light of the recent evidence, do the Government accept that pollution that stems from the chemical industry and paint manufacture is poisoning and killing seals, other aquatic animals and fish? I speak of the evidence that has been produced in the past 24 hours.

Mrs. Bottomley: I knew that it was unwise to give way to the hon. Gentleman. He knows that the virus that is affecting seals is a natural one. He referred to waste from industry, and he knows that pollution can take place in the water, in the air and on the land. If the hon. Gentleman bears with me, he will come to understand that that is the precise justification for the integrated pollution inspectorate, which we established recently. The inspectorate will be able to examine pollution that is caused by any discharge. That is extremely important.
The Humber has benefited from clean-up programmes, especially of the Trent, and further improvements will come about through schemes to tackle some of the badly polluted Yorkshire rivers that feed into the Humber.
How does all this relate to the titanium dioxide industry? It is because through the use of environmental quality objectives that we have been implementing the article 9 reduction programme drawn up with the industry following the 1978 directive. We have laid down environmental quality standards—these set maximum concentration levels for acid and iron—and the companies have invested in new longer outfalls to achieve better dilution and dispersion of the discharges. For example, as a result of the new outfalls, the area of the Humber affected by pollution from acid will be reduced by 90 per cent. This is a considerable achievement.
The Government have long recognised the concern about wastes from the industry in environmental terms.
That is why, when applications from the two Humberside factories were made to Anglian water authority in 1986 for new discharge consents, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State called them in for determination. It was the first occasion on which these powers under the Control of Pollution Act 1974 had been used. Subsequently, the applications were considered at public inquiries in October 1987. Although the applications for discharge consent were substantially approved, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made it clear in his decision letters earlier this year that he would be looking to review the consents after two years with the view to seeking reductions in the total amount of waste discharged. That will necessarily involve changes to the production processes and the use of less-polluting technology.
That decision has to be seen in the light of the North sea conference declaration last year and the actions agreed by member states substantially to reduce inputs of contaminants reaching the North sea via rivers and estuaries by 1995. Although the main wastes produced by the industry are not persistent or liable to bio-accumulate, they are significantly polluting, and wastes from the industry are specifically indentified in the declaration on the North sea as one of the areas for possible future action.
I should mention two other developments in the environmental context that are now relevant to consideration of the Commission's proposals. First, the Government—as part of a more precautionary approach to the environment—published proposals in the summer for a new unified approach to the control of the most dangerous substances to water, which were identified as the red list.
For industrial processes discharging those substances, we will apply technology-based emissions standards for the first time, incorporating the concept of best available technology not entailing excessive costs, in combination with our more traditional style of strict environmental quality standards. The aim is to minimise the amounts of those substances reaching the aquatic environment and that will require, among other things, investment by industry in better effluent control technology. Industry has generally welcomed those proposals, although we are still considering the detailed responses to our consultation.
Secondly at the same time, we published consultative proposals for a new system of integrated pollution control for major industrial processes—to which I was referring when the hon. Member for Bootle (Mr. Roberts) intervened a moment ago—designed to minimise the overall impact of discharges to land, air and water. That follows the recommendations of the Royal Commission on environmental pollution for wastes to be disposed of according to the concept of best practicable environmental option and the setting up last year of Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution as a cross-media pollution control agency responsible for the development of a more integrated approach to pollution control. That seeks to minimise so far as is practicable the amount and harmful affects of waste arising from such processes. The titanium dioxide industry, which discharges waste to water, to air and to land is an obvious candidate for just that sort of approach.
We have to consider the Commission's proposals against that background. The proposal for a new directive

to harmonise member states' pollution reduction programmes was first put forward by the Commission in 1983. The proposal at that time gave us some difficulty. We considered that the appropriate way to control discharges of waste from the industry was according to the system of environmental quality objectives. Such an approach is consistent with the method of control laid down for list II substances in the dangerous substances directive. This specifies that the emission standards for such substances should be based on quality objectives.
In contrast, the Commission's proposal was based upon the use of Communitywide limit values. Those are essentially uniform emission standards set for all plants irrespective of location and the nature of the receiving waters for their discharge. We have always preferred to control discharges with reference to environmental quality objectives and standards which allow for the ability of receiving waters to assimilate discharges without harm to the aquatic environment. As our factories are located on large fast-flowing estuaries which offer good dilution, we have always believed that they should be allowed to benefit from those locational advantages.
The House of Lords Select Committee on the European Communities shared our concern about the Commission's proposal. The Committee, in its February 1984 report, expressed itself
greatly concerned that the draft Directive, contrary to the provisions of the parent Directive and other Directives concerned with water pollution, imposes a system of fixed emission standards without any option of a parallel approach of environmental quality objectives".
That advice which strongly reaffirmed existing policy for water pollution control, provided the basis for our further negotiations on the proposed directive. Because of the nature of the substances discharged by the industry, we could see a persuasive case for arguing that only the environmental quality objective approach need be used. Consequently, we were not then prepared to support that proposal.
Our position has changed since 1983. First, I have already described the main developments in pollution control policy as a result of both domestic and international developments. In particular, we now accept the need for a more precautionary approach to the aquatic environment based on the complementary use environmental quality standards and technology-based emission standards for the most dangerous red list substances.
We are actively implementing those parts of the North sea conference declaration calling for substantial reductions in inputs of contaminants via rivers and estuaries. We are actively developing a more integrated approach to pollution control in this country, taking account of the effects of an industrial process on the environment as a whole.
Secondly, there is now wider public acceptance of the need for higher environmental standards, and industry, is responding to that. Consequently, it is right that we should now consider the next stage of the article 9 reduction programmes for the titanium dioxide industry with a view to achieving substantial reductions in the amounts discharged when the new consents are reviewed in 1990. Such reductions will call for specific measures by the companies concerned.
Thirdly, there is little doubt that recent discussion of the proposal has been influenced by the outcome of the important North sea conference hosted by my right hon.
Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment. Equally, the proposal has been strongly supported by a number of other member states, especially Germany and the Netherlands, which are encouraging their industries to invest heavily in cleaner technology. To a large extent, that involves replacing old sulphate capacity with new chloride capacity. I should point out that United Kingdom industry has been doing that over the past decade and currently has most of the installed chloride capacity in the Community.
After a period of some years in which this proposal was given little precedence in discussions of the European Council, negotiations began again in earnest in late 1987. Initially, our participation in the detailed negotiations was constrained by the public inquiries into the proposed discharge consents on Humberside, which were then taking place under the Control of Pollution Act 1974. Until their outcome was known and the Secretary of State had made his decisions public, we had to avoid saying anything which might be prejudicial to those cases.
As a result of a short intensive period of negotiations at the June 1988 Environment Council, the German presidency put forward a package of principles for agreement designed to reflect so far as possible the concerns of all member states, and intended as the basis for future agreement.
The compromise package was made up of the following elements. First was the prohibition of the discharge of strong acid wastes and solid wastes from both processes and treatment wastes from the sulphate process to all waters from 31 December 1989, although where individual member states face particular difficulties the date might be put back to 1 July 1993.
Secondly, the discharge of other wastes to all waters would be regulated either by reference to limit values or by reference to enviromental quality objectives. Thirdly, there would be rules, to be agreed, on discharges to the atmosphere. That package proved to be a helpful way forward. The Commission's proposal was first presented in 1983. The continued failure to adopt a directive had left our titanium dioxide industry uncertain as to future pollution control measures. The industry found it difficult to plan future investment. Adoption of the proposed directive would provide the industry with the certainty and stability it needs to conduct and expand its business.
The measures proposed were stringent but feasible, even though the proposed time limits allowed barely sufficient time for all the necessary work to be completed. The compromise also protected our policy on environmental quality objectives and was consistent with the precautionary approach. There was a clear advantage in exploring it further and at the Environment Council my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, East (Mr. Moynihan) agreed, together with the other Ministers, that the compromise should provide the basis for further consideration of the proposal.
In further detailed discussions since then, over the last few months, good progress has been made in a number of areas. Numerical values have been set for the limit values applicable to the weaker wastes. Rather than lay down numerical environmental quality objectives, the working party has chosen to place upon member states using that approach the burden of satisfying the Commission that its approach is being used correctly. Agreement has been reached on the numerical values for the controls on discharges to the atmosphere and for the dates of their applications.
We remain concerned that the Commission has changed the legal base of this proposal from articles 100 and 235 of the treaty to the new article 100A. Although we can understand that the Commission wishes to concentrate on the single market aspects of this proposal and the importance of avoiding distortions of competition, we are unhappy that the Commission should choose to disregard the new environmental article 130S. We believe that it would be an unfortunate precedent for article 100A to be used for what seems to us fundamentally misguided reasons, particularly when so much progress has been made to reach a sensible environmental consensus.
We hope that reason will prevail and that my noble Friend the Earl of Caithness will be able to negotiate a satisfactory resolution of this issue. The alternative would be further damaging uncertainty for the industry. We believe that adoption of the proposal will safeguard the interests of our industry by giving it a secure framework for planning its future operations and will lead to important environmental gains.

Mr. Allan Roberts: The draft directive is welcome, to the extent that it makes improvements, but it does not go far enough. We have heard from the Minister the history of the negotiations—once again a history in which Britain, within the EEC, has been trying to hold up and limit the controls on the grounds that the Government are protecting British interests, environmental controls and industry.
The main aim of the directive is the prevention and progressive reduction of pollution caused by wastes from the titanium dioxide industry. Eventually, we hope, all pollution will be eliminated. Titanium dioxide is a white pigment used in paints and for other purposes. Its manufacture may result in a much larger quantity of waste than product, and this has frequently been dumped at sea or discharged into estuaries. Much of it is still disposed of in that way.
The directive would provide for the dumping of wastes at sea to be banned by 31 December 1989. Discharges of solid wastes, strong acid and treatment wastes from the sulphide process and discharges of solid waste and strong acid wastes from the chloride process into all waters would be banned by 1 December 1989. The Opposition welcome both proposals. In certain circumstances, that date could be put back to 1 July 1993. What are those circumstances? We would guess that the British Government got that written into the directive.
Discharges of weak acid waste and treatment waste from the chloride process to all waters would be substantially reduced by 31 December 1989 by limit values to be fixed, although in certain circumstances that date could also be put back. The emissions into the air would be limited, as the Minister said, and, as an alternative to using the limit values referred to in the two previous examples, discharges might be controlled by reference to environmental quality objectives, to be fixed by the Community. We welcome that. Labour Members do not believe in the gospel according to limit values. We want stricter controls than the Government's reliance on limit values provides. The legal base for the directive is to be decided later. The Government might, to coin a phrase, be


treading water in the future if industry has not had the necessary expenditure made available to it to control its emissions.
We are concerned that the control of discharges of wastes from the industry in the United Kingdom is, in the view of the Department of the Environment, on the basis that stated environmental quality standards—EQSs, as the Government call them—are complied with in respect of discharges to water. The standards are set on the basis of scientific evidence and the controls on discharges are set so as to protect the receiving environment. We do not think that they are set in a way that protects the receiving environment, as evidence shows. They allow the United Kingdom to use and benefit from the absorptive capacity of our estuaries—the dispersal concept, to which the Government cling, even though dispersal in estuaries and in our seas has been proved to be misguided and to lead to a cumulative build-up of pollutants.
If adopted, the proposal would require, according to the Department of the Environment and the Minister, the banning of the more polluting types of waste from discharges and would require other discharges to be controlled according to Communitywide limit values, which we welcome. However, the Government claim—as, I am sure, will hon. Members who represent constituencies in which the titanium dioxide industry is based that it will lead to additional costs for the industry. It is claimed that the provisions could add about 10 per cent. to production costs. That would clearly have implications for the profitability of the United Kingdom's titanium dioxide industry, although in general those costs could be absorbed.
I, too, am concerned about jobs in the industry, but if the directive applies to our competitors as well as to the United Kingdom, the expenditure that will be incurred to implement the controls will have to be borne by them as well as by the British industry. It is said that the directive represents a serious threat to employment in the industry, but if we consider what other countries have done to control the discharge of titanium dioxide because of its environmental consequences, we see that the United Kingdom has no excuse for continuing to discharge such powerful pollutants into the rivers or the sea.
The acid waste that is discharged by the titanium dioxide industry has four components: dilute sulphuric acid, differing concentrations of many heavy metals, very high concentrations of iron and residual ore. Those are very powerful pollutants that are being discharged into our rivers and seas. The immediate effect of these pollutants on biological systems results from the acidification of the water. The acid causes direct death of the single-celled organisms called plankton. They are the plants that are important for generating oxygen in the water that is used by other organisms. Plankton also provide the basic foodstuff for other life forms in the water, but the plankton are destroyed.
There are also differing concentrations of many heavy metals that are discharged into the rivers and seas by means of titanium dioxide pollution. They are found in titanium, zinc, chromium, nickel, copper, lead, arsenic, cadmium and mercury. The effects of heavy metals, even in trace concentrations, are wll documented. They have

remarkable powers of accumulating into higher organisms through food chains. It is the "Ilkley Moor baht 'at" syndrome:
Then ducks will come and eat up worms
And then we'll come and eat up ducks.
The fish absorb the nickel, copper, lead, arsenic and mercury, and we eat the fish. Heavy metals have been shown to affect a wide variety of marine organisms, causing fin-rot erosion, disease in fish and shell diseases in crabs and lobsters. They can also affect humans. Minamata disease is poisoning by mercury.
The high concentration of ferrous sulphate in the waste has severe effects on aquatic organisms and may be considered to be the most important damaging factor in acid waste. Cockles and mussels in the Humber, into which a great deal of the titanium dioxide is discharged, have been affected, and human beings cannot eat them. However, birds and fish eat them. The birds are then eaten by other forms of wildlife, and we eat that wildlife. It can be very dangerous.
It has been shown in laboratory experiments that flounders subjected to dilutions of titanium dioxide acid waste collect a brown precipitate, consisting of iron titanium, on their gills. The precipitate in turn affects the fish, altering their conditions to such an extent that they are unable to swim properly. In this way metals can be readily concentrated into living organisms. Flounders caught in the areas where titanium dioxide waste is dumped contain 12 times more lead, eight times more copper, three times more cadmium and twice as much zinc as fish caught in unpolluted waters. The pollution consequences are enormous.
Tests have been carried out recently on dead seals in Liverpool bay, pointing to the illegal dumping of paints or resins, titanium dioxide and other substances. High levels of mercury contamination have been found in the dead seals. The analysis of blubber and liver samples from four grey seals and a pilot whale showed high readings of a form of polychlorinated byphenyls—PCBs—used only in the production of paints and resins. Levels similar to those found in the Dutch Waddenzee could be expected to interfere with reproductive processes.
Those are the findings of tests done this week, yet the Government—the Minister repeated it today—still say that this pollution does not kill the seals. They say that the seals have a natural virus and that pollution has nothing to do with it. That is absolute nonsense. The Government are hiding their head in the sand. If pollution does not cause the virus, it lowers the resistance of seals and other sea animals to the virus. It creates the problem. If the Government had really adopted a precautionary approach, they would be ending the pollution of our seas and estuaries to save the seals. In reality, their policy assists with the seals' deaths.
The Green party would solve the problem by closing the factories. The Conservative party wants, reluctantly, to interfere with the free market, but it allows the pollution to continue when it should not. The Labour party believes that we can have jobs and an industry which is run in an environmentally sound way. We believe that it is not necessary to pollute and destroy our environment to keep industry going.
In 1978, the Council adopted a directive which required member states to take certain actions in respect of wastes produced by the titanium dioxide industry and to establish national reduction programmes for the prevention and


eventual elimination of pollution caused by such waste. The Commission published proposals. Now, 10 years after the first directive, white pigment makers are still split about how to deal with acid and metal waste.
Germany is building acid recycling plants, and the Netherlands is switching to another manufacturing process. The United Kingdom's answer? Lengthening outfalls from the Humber and elsewhere to dump the pollutants into the sea rather than into the estuaries. A recycling plant is now under construction at Duisburg in West Germany. When it comes on stream at the end of this year it will reclaim 99 per cent. of the factory's waste sulphuric acid. Sachtleben's plant will also handle the waste from another German manufacturer—Kronos Titan. The chemical giant Bayer already has an acid recovery facility of a different design, the output of which is used on other processes. The spur of the plants is environmental legislation. Five years ago, West German firms were given a deadline of 1990 to stop dumping in the North sea. Belgium and the Netherlands have enacted similar laws. Once again, the United Kingdom is lagging way behind.
The titanium dioxide industry in the United Kingdom seems intent on exaggerating costs and availability of alternative technology to delay acceptance and implementation of the directive. Such corporate exaggeration, supported to some extent by the Government, is typical of companies, the operations of which take no account of social and environmental costs. They have successfully manufactured a scenario in which there appears to be only one option open to industry on implementation of the directive—cessation of operations. We do not believe that that is the only option.
A wide array of methods for waste treatment is available to the titanium industry. Some merely neutralise the acidic component of the waste; others produce useful by-products. Several techniques that completely recycle the waste are available. They include neutralisation. I shall not go into detail, because we do not have the time, but some companies have neutralised waste to gain profitable by-products which offset the cost of the processes. It is quite possible for the British industry, with the Government's assistance, to deal with the directive in such a way as to benefit the industry. There are jobs in the production of environmentally sound technologies and in recycling much of the waste which is at the moment put into estuaries and seas.
I welcome the directive to the extent that it moves us forward. I welcome some of what the Minister said. We are suspicious that, under pressure from the industry, the Government will not assist by making available the resources that are needed for recycling to prevent dumping and for the removal of longer outfalls—for which they have just given planning permission—which dump the titanium oxide in our seas.

Mr. Michael Brown: My hon. Friend the Minister will be pleased to know that I do not seek to divide the House on the draft directive. I welcome the specific wording employed by my hon. Friend and her colleagues. I draw the attention of the House specifically to the words:
That this House … supports the Government's intention to seek to ensure that the provisions of any new directive should take full account both of the need to protect the

environment and the need to ensure that the interests of the United Kingdom's titanium dioxide producers are safeguarded.
I am particularly concerned with those interests.
In her opening remarks, my hon. Friend referred to Humberside Members of Parliament. I am privileged to represent one of the country's titanium dioxide factories which is operated by SCM Chemicals, a subsidiary of the Hanson Trust group of companies. That organisation employs 700 people, many of whom are my constituents, although some may be constituents of the hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Morley) or of the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell). Until 1982, that company which was then known as Laporte, employed about 1,600 people. The work force has been halved, yet the yearly output, which was about 85,000 tonnes at the end of the 1970s, is now about 115,000 tonnes. That shows how the industry has been able to cope with the problems of the world recession earlier in the decade, and it is still a massive provider of jobs in my constituency.
The hon. Member for Bootle (Mr. Roberts) has been somewhat unfair. I do not often disagree with him on environmental issues, but on this occasion he is wrong. The industry is aware of pressures from Europe, from the European Commission and from the Government, that require it to recognise that there is a sea change—a political change and a change in public perception. Those in the industry do not want to be bad neighbours and create environmental pollution. However, we are not talking about chickenfeed. The hon. Member for Bootle felt that it would be easy for companies to comply with the directive, but it has been estimated that for SCM Chemicals, the capital expenditure involved would amount to £24 million—depending on the final details of the directive—and that £1·25 million would be spent on additional gas cleaning equipment to reduce air emissions. That is not chickenfeed; that is a major financial outlay that has to be argued for when the company seeks approval for capital expenditure from its senior board.
I was glad to hear my hon. Friend express the Government's concern at the use of article 100A, which allows the proposal to be adopted by majority voting, when previously, under articles 100 and 235, unanimity would he needed. I was also very glad to hear my hon. Friend's assurance that the Government would be pressing hard for that.
The draft directive and tonight's debate are timely because I understand that the draft directive is to be considered by the Council of Ministers on 24 November. I am glad that my hon. Friend put on record a number of proposals which my hon. Friend the Minister of State will be presenting on behalf of the Government at that Council meeting.
I want to put one or two points to the Minister, to which I hope she will respond if she is able to catch your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker. My comments challenge what was said by the hon. Member for Bootle. He said that there would be no unfair competition for this country. He implied that there would be a level playing field and that the directive would apply equally across the Community. I do not think that that is the case. I can give two examples.
One unsatisfactory feature of the directive with regard to the chloride process is that a German chloride process of 80,000-tonne annual capacity, discharging its waste into the Rhine, will be allowed to discharge up to 150 tonnes of


calcium chloride or sodium chloride into fresh water each day. A proposed 40,000-tonne plant on the Ghent-Terneuzen canal in Belgium will be allowed to discharge 78 tonnes a day into fresh water. That is not fair.
Another unsavoury aspect of the directive is the introduction of the concept of equality of competition. It should not be the responsibility of a directive such as this to introduce equality of competition. I understand that, in the interest of equality of competition, the same limits are imposed on the two United Kingdom plants, both of which discharge a sodium-calcium chloride brine into the marine environment. Such legislation, masquerading as environmental protection, does nothing to encourage the sensible siting of plants so as to have minimum environmental effects. In the German and Belgian cases the plants could have been sited on the coast had they addressed environmental requirements rather than proximity to markets.

Mr. Allan Roberts: Does the hon. Gentleman accept that one of the difficulties faced by British industry is that the Government have not put pressure on the industry in the same way as other Governments, so we are behind in introducing alternative methods of dealing with the waste? In Japan, one of our competitors, the marine disposal of titanium dioxide was forbidden in 1978, and 60 per cent. of the waste is treated with ammonia. The resultant ammonia sulphate is used as a fertiliser. An annual production of 100,000 tonnes is sold. It is the same in Germany and Holland. They have the plants and are producing side-products that can be sold to make a profit for the industry. We could do the same.

Mr. Brown: I do not agree. Many years ago, successive Governments co-operated to ensure that the titanium dioxide industry in Britain was sensibly located. It is an unpleasant process. However, it is a fact of life. We all use white paint and white paper. Everything that is white has titanium dioxide in it. Over the years Britain has been ahead of its rivals. Our rivals have sited their plants near their markets but we have ensured that the plants have been sited sensibly on the coast. That is not to say that we should simply discharge waste into the estuaries.
I do not agree with the hon. Member for Bootle that the Government have done nothing. I spend a lot of time with the senior management of SCM Chemicals in my constituency. I am told of the pressures brought to bear on them by my hon. Friend the Minister and her predecessors. The industry would argue that the Government have been tough and strong in the way in which they have asked the industry to clean up its act. The industry recognises that there is a political dimension and that it has to address public opinion, as do the Government and Europe.
I have reservations about the directive, but I recognise that we are too far down the road to be able to start from scratch. My hon. Friend the Minister said that a public inquiry was under way in 1987, when we might have been negotiating hard on the detail of the directive. The Government were precluded from playing their part in the early stages of those negotiations. They have had to work hard and fast to secure the best interests of the titanium dioxide industry. If there is a lesson for the future, it is essential that, once it is obvious that a European draft directive will involve some control of the industry, the

Government should use their expertise in Europe to protect the interests of the environment and of those who work in the industry. We have lost out a little, for the reasons that I have outlined and that I fully understand.
It appears that the final directive will be approved on 24 November. I hope that when my hon. Friend replies to the debate she will be able to assuage my worry about the lack of a level playing field and confirm that the Government will be pressing hard at the meeting of the Council of Ministers next week.

Mr. Elliot Morley: I welcome the draft directive. It is a useful step in harmonising European pollution levels.
I represent part of the Humberside area and my constituency abuts the River Humber. There is no point in denying that for a long time there have been considerable problems with industrial waste from many outlets on the estuary. They have had demonstrable effects on the decline of Humber fisheries. At one time, there was a thriving inshore fishery, but it has declined dramatically in recent years.
There is a new fishery on the Humber that abuts my constituency and that of the hon. Member for Brigg and Cleethorpes (Mr. Brown). I should not claim that such a fishery employs as many people as a titanium dioxide factory, but nevertheless it is important to employment in the area. The fishery relies almost exclusively on exports, and the directive will do much to assist it by making it clear that the Government are adamant about them taking steps to clean the estuary.
I do not wish to hold the titanium oxide industry responsible for all the pollution of the River Humber—it is no better or worse than other industries. It is better, however, than the Government's record regarding the amount of raw sewage that is dumped into the estuary.
I know well the arguments that have been advanced about the importance of the titanium oxide industry receiving the same treatment as its European rivals so that it can be competitive and can protect jobs in the area. That is a fair and valid argument, but it underlines one of the strengths of the directive. It would not be fair if one of our industries was at a disadvantage by having to implement stronger pollution controls than its rivals on the continent.
It could be argued that, if there is equal treatment in the Community, the industry may be at a disadvantage with its competitors outside the Community, which may not apply the same rigorous standards. When the Council of Ministers meets, it should discuss a form of environmental tax on products entering the Community from competitors that do not apply the same rigorous standards of pollution control and are therefore an unfair form of competition. That would answer the arguments advanced by some industries in the EEC—that these measures cost jobs and put them at a disadvantage.

Mr. Michael Brown: The problem with the hon. Gentleman's argument is that about 60 per cent. of this country's production of titanium dioxide is exported. The industry has to compete in the world market; it faces competition from Australia, non-EEC and Third-world countries.

Mr. Morley: That is a valid point. The answer is to campaign throughout the developed nations to get them to


apply similar controls, and to use the EEC's considerable influence in world markets to suggest to countries involved in unfair competition that the EEC will not regard them favourably in future dealings. As an advanced industrialised country, we must set an example to other countries which may not share our scruples.
I am concerned, too, about the Government's response to the directive. The explanatory memorandum reads:
It is better to dispose of most wastes to waters where they are rapidly diluted and dispersed.
I disagree strongly. We do not know the long-term consequences of marine pollution in the North sea. About 20 million cu m of sewage are dumped every day—on top of 15 million cu m of chemical waste.
The Minister referred to the recent seal virus as a natural virus. That is only partly true. Scientific evidence points to a link between pollution and the suppression of the seals' immune system, which reduces their resistance to infection. I am sure that the Minister does not underestimate the public concern about the pollution of the sea that was highlighted by the seal problem. It was well expressed in a petition organised by the children of Rochdale road school in Scunthorpe, who have called for action to help the seals.
The directive goes a long way towards dealing with marine pollution. It would not be fair to single out any one industry. I do not want to make the titanium dioxide industry the scapegoat for all the problems of the North sea. The algae bloom last May, which was triggered off by a high concentration of nitrates and phosphates, and which reduced 100,000 sq km of the seabed to a biologically dead wilderness, showed the scale of the problem.
I deeply regret the Government's weak-kneed qualifications of the directive. I do not want any industry in this country to be disadvantaged: these controls must be applied fairly and vigorously across the EEC to ensure that the seas are safe for future generations.

Mrs. Virginia Bottomley: With the leave of the House, I wish to answer the debate.
In response to the hon. Member for Bootle (Mr. Roberts), I make it clear that the reason for the possibility of extending the time limit to 1993 from December 1989 is that, if there are cases of major techno-economic difficulty, this is a way of protecting the industries concerned. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Cleethorpes (Mr. Brown) and the hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Morley), who have spoken forcefully for their constituents and local industries, will appreciate that.
I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Cleethorpes that the standards applicable to plants discharging into inland waters should be stricter than those applicable to plants discharging into salt water. We have pressed hard for that in the Council, but have so fair received no support from other member states. But I am sure that my noble Friend the Earl of Caithness will make the point again at next week's Environment Council.
I hope that we are all agreed on the need to end the uncertainty and inaction which the protracted negotiations on this proposal have caused. We have the clear prospect of agreement on a measure that would produce significant benefits for the water environment and that would provide industry with a clear and practical basis on which to plan its future investment.
I have listened carefully to hon. Members' comments, and I shall bring them to the attention of my noble Friend before he attends the Council meeting on 25 November.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That this House takes note of European Community Documents Nos 6387/83 and 7733/84 and the Supplementary Explanatory Memoranda submitted by the Department of the Environment on 14th June and 22nd July 1988 on waste from the titanium dioxide industry; and supports the Government's intention to seek to ensure that the provisions of any new directive should take full account both of the need to protect the environment and of the need to ensure that the interests of the United Kingdom's titanium dioxide producers are safeguarded.

Articulated Vehicles

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr. Peter Bottomley): I beg to move,
That this House takes note of European Community Document No. 6882/88 on the dimensions of articulated vehicles; and endorses the Government's objective of resisting this proposed directive on the grounds that longer articulated vehicles would present significant environmental disadvantages to the United Kingdom.
The Commission proposes to amend directive 85/3 EEC by increasing the maximum length of articulated vehicles from 15·5 m to 16·5 m. The Government oppose that for significant reasons: it is environmentally more intrusive; it will increase the risk of road accidents; and it will disadvantage British hauliers. The Commission was correct to identify the problem, but its proposed solution is wrong.
I often wish that when we talk about social space, others in the Community would spend more time listening to those who have been run over by articulated lorries, which cut in, destroy cyclists, damage pedestrians and do other things with which we in Britain cope rather better. If the rest of the Community had our road safety record, 40 per cent. fewer people would be injured, whether by long articulated lorries or in other ways. We have much to teach the Community. It might spend some time examining the minibus driving directive, too, because we have more welfare journeys in small minibuses than they have in other European countries.
The directive is not accompanied by a limit on the minimum dimensions of the cab or coupling mechanism, or the maximum dimensions of the semi-trailer. Consequently, some continental operators—mainly French, Belgian and Dutch—have sought to maximise the length of the semi-trailer within the international limit of 15·5 m. They increase loading space at the expense of the coupling mechanism and the driver's cab. They have exploited a loophole in the directive, with the result that the safety and ergonomic conditions of the driver have been reduced.
To maintain articulation of the vehicle, novel and potentially unsafe coupling mechanisms have been introduced. The semi-trailers that have been built are about 13·6 m long—more than 1 m longer than those used in the United Kingdom for domestic transportation. The directive allows for that type of configuration for international transport. The United Kingdom, as well as adopting an overall length of 15·5 m, also restricts the size of the loading space of the semi-trailer to 12·2 m. That allows adequate cab and coupling dimensions within the 15·5 m and the transportation of the popular ISO standard 40 ft container.
The technical developments by continental operators to maximise the semi-trailer length improve the economic use of commercial road vehicles. They allow the transportation of more pallets or, in the extreme, the longer 45 ft container. According to the Commission's proposal, those developments have negative effects on the health, safety and comfort of the driver and the quality of transport. The United Kingdom agrees with those observations.
Let us turn now to the Commission's misplaced solution. It should have plugged the loophole by setting a semi-trailer length dimension on the lines of United Kingdom legislation. Instead, within the 15·5 m envelope,

the Commission has chosen to allow the longer semi-trailer to continue in operation. It has attempted to provide for adequate cab and coupling dimensions by increasing the overall length of the combination by 1 m to 16·5 m. The ISO standard No. 1726 for the dimensions forward of the semi-trailer kingpin is given prominence in the proposed directive to ensure that the overall turning circle of the combination is not increased over and above that of the 15·5 m articulated units that predominate at present.
This proposal allowing the extra metre would present extra difficulties in overtaking or being overtaken by these vehicles, not just on motorways, but on every sort of road. On crowded roads it would cause more congestion, and there would be an added safety risk to vulnerable users of the road, such as pedestrians and cyclists, due to the added tendency for the longer semi-trailer to cut in on the pavement when the vehicle turns a corner. I do not want to load all the blame for injuries to pedestrians and cyclists on articulated vehicles, but I remind the House that, in Britain, 60,000 pedestrians and 30,000 cyclists were injured last year. Those are underestimates, because the information is that roughly three times as many cyclists are injured as are reported in our accident figures.
The United Kingdom is opposed to any increase in the length of articulated vehicles because of the effect on traffic movement and the additional risk that it poses for road safety. Another reason for United Kingdom opposition to the proposal is that, as currently drafted, it would have the effect of prejudicing the use in international transport of vehicles built to current British standards. The proposed directive would require all new articulated vehicles entering into circulation after 1 July next year to comply with the technical provisions of the directive. This does not mean that the vehicle would have to be used at 16·5 m, but it means that the tractor and semi-trailer would have to be built to the ISO standard before they could be allowed to run at over 15·5 m on international transport.
The United Kingdom-type tractors and semi-trailers are incompatible with the proposed construction requirements for tractors and semi-trailers. The nose of the United Kingdom trailer is shorter, and less space is allowed for it behind the tractor cab. An ISO trailer has a longer nose and will not fit on a United Kingdom tractor. The semi-trailers built to meet the proposed directive would not be able to be towed by British-type two-axle tractor units because the semi-trailer would foul the back of the cab. This would place United Kingdom operators at a disadvantage against their European counterparts. To meet the turning circle requirements of the directive, a three-axle unit could not be used in conjunction with a two-axle semi-trailer at an overall length of 16·5 m. This is recognised in the proposed directive, which allows only the two-axle tractor unit with the three-axle semi-trailers, or the more expensive three-axle tractors with three-axle semi-trailers to run at 16·5 m.
The Commission's proposal, in favouring the two-axle tractor unit, ignores the fact that heavy loads are better carried by a three-axle tractor than a two-axle tractor. It makes no sense to introduce a regulation that has a bias against the less damaging three-axle tractor unit.
We benefit from the services of the lorry. It plays a vital role in our economy. The haulage industry should be able to function within necessary controls. Much has been done to reduce the unpleasant effects of lorries and to improve safety. The heavy lorries' record on accident reduction


over the past decade is far better than that for cars. There needs to be the right balance between the needs of freight movement and those of other road users. The proposal does not strike that balance. There is a technical solution to the squat cab problem, and the United Kingdom has already adopted it. Those member states that have exploited the loophole in the directive should not be allowed to use this to gain yet longer lorries. The United Kingdom's line is strongly against this type of vehicle combination being increased in length any further. The House should endorse the motion.

Mr. Tony Lloyd: Once again, the Minister and I are playing to a packed gallery on this fascinating subject, which has important consequences. The Minister has read his speech well, and I have some sympathy with his argument. There is no doubt that we would face problems if the EC directive were to be adopted.
I shall ask the Minister a straightforward question, and it will not surprise him to learn that I already know the answer to it. Will he confirm that this directive is subject to the qualified majority voting system? I see the Minister nodding to confirm that. Could he also confirm that the Government accepted that that is an acceptable way for things to be done? We now depend on other countries to support the case put forward by the United Kingdom. I hope that the Minister will tell us which EC countries are prepared to reject the directive. It is important that we know from where our support will come. We need a combination of other nations to build the 23 votes that are required to overturn that qualified majority. That can come only from one of the larger Community nations with one of the medium sized ones, or by a combination of small ones.
It is pointless pretending that the House of Commons has a scrutiny role when it is in fact powerless in this respect. The presence tonight of the Government Chief Whip, the right hon. and learned Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Waddington), is interesting, but I doubt whether he has hundreds of troops rallied outside for fear that the Opposition will seek to press the House to a Division on the issue—[Interruption.] The right hon. and learned Gentleman tells me that I might be surprised, but I am never surprised at anything that goes on in this place. I can assure him that I do not intend to press the matter to a Division, because I am not sure what would be the effect if we did not take note of the document. I do not believe that that would advance the case in Europe one jot.
We are now in the hands of people who have an incentive to force the directive on to the freight industry and on to those in this country who depend on that industry. It is a peculiar state of affairs that other nations should have an incentive to adopt a directive to our disadvantage, yet we have to persuade the Council of Ministers to support us, on the basis either of good nature or of horse trading.
One of the legitimate reasons for opposing the directive is that our roads and bridges are not capable of taking the impact that would result from its implementation. The directive would allow gross axle weights to be increased from the present maximum of 10·5 tonnes to 11·5 tonnes. Will the Minister confirm that there are about 11,000 sub-standard bridges in Great Britain and that it will cost about £750 million to strengthen them so that they can

take the 40-tonne limit that I have Government have chosen to adopt instead of the 38-tonne limit that we presently operate?
The Minister looks a little puzzled about that, but that was the evidence of his Department's officials to the. Public Accounts Committee some time ago. Those officials said that it was the Department's policy to raise the standard of those bridges to the 40-tonne limit. I shall be happy to show the Minister his officials' evidence later, if he wishes.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: The bridges are being strengthened, but the hon. Gentleman will realise that the British derogation is based on what we put forward as a 15-year programme. I do not think that we should echo his comments because they might be heard outside the House and people might then misinterpret the Labour party's position on the issue. I hope that we shall have a blocking minority on this draft directive and that we shall retain the Labour party's support against such ideas as the hon. Gentleman was putting forward—which, on reflection, he might regret tomorrow morning.

Mr. Lloyd: I should be a little surprised if the European Commission or the Council of Ministers took greater note of my comments than of those of senior officials of the Department of Transport.
One of the problems with the 15-year programme mentioned by the Minister is that, at present levels of spending, the Government will not achieve the upgrading of those bridges over that period. It is a matter of simple mathematics. The Minister might wish to tell the House that the bridge-strengthening programme is to be greatly increased. That would be in the interests of the travelling public of Britain, but I do not believe that the Minister can say that, because such expenditure was not mentioned in the Government's spending plans earlier this year. In any case, the Government are not able to ratify the directive.
If the directive is adopted and forced through by the majority in the Council of Ministers, against the will of the British Government, what will be the consequences for the exemption that will apply to all freight that was on the roads before 1989, given that the trailers to which the Minister referred measure 13·6 m? Under the cabotage arrangements, they would be free to ply their trade on the roads of this country. That would pose a serious threat to our roads and bridges; and it is important that the public should be aware of that fact.
Yet again, the unsatisfactory way in which we scrutinise European legislation is underlined. The directive is unacceptable and runs counter to the needs of the travelling public in Britain, yet we are in no position to do anything unless we are prepared to go cap in hand to other members of the Community.
I am used to the Minister telling me that I am not a good European every time I say that European legislation is not satisfactory, although I am not sure whether simply resisting European legislation is being a bad European. The Minister tells us that we should be maximising the advantages of the European Community process, so perhaps he will reflect on my question. Earlier, he told us that Europe had a lot to learn from us. If the Council of Ministers forces the directive through against Britain's interests, how shall we have maximised the advantages of the European process, given that we know that the: provision will be severely to the disadvantage of the British freight industry, consumer and road user?


For those reasons, I support the motion. There is no ambiguity about that. Nevertheless, I must add that many of the problems that have arisen have been invoked by the Government.

Mr. Kenneth Warren: I agree wholeheartedly with my hon. Friend the Minister in his opposition to the directive. I also understand why the hon. Member for Stretford (Mr. Lloyd) finds it difficult to make his way through the tangle. I understand, too, that Mr. Stanley Clinton Davis, who speaks on behalf of the European Commission on these matters, may shortly be standing as a candidate with a view to joining the hon. Gentleman on the Labour Benches, where he has been before.
The question that really concerns me is how the proposal arose at all. The EEC is after one more metre to solve a problem; but where did the problem come from in the first place? My hon. Friend will know that I have communicated with him over a number of years about the length of vehicles because our own Department of Transport takes no account of that factor when considering traffic loads on roads—for example, in determining whether a by-pass should be built.
The United Kingdom solution should be promoted by the House and there should be all-party agreement on the matter. The explanatory memorandum put forward by the Commission reeks of problems—problems identified in part by my hon. Friend the Minister—concerning the general safety of the promotion of yet one more metre. It is rather like the last straw that breaks the camel's back.
What about the road requirements? No one in the Commission seems to have taken any account of the problems of the roads in Greece and southern Ireland.
One wonders how those in Brussels have got themselves into this tangle, which is recorded inadequately in the explanatory memorandum. Apparently the directive which has already been adopted
implicates that a number of vehicles which were built according to that motion will be prohibited.
Legally, we are told, it will be difficult to make this correct in retrospect. It is simply not acceptable that we should endorse a mistake, especially as it would mean that some old semi-trailers on the road would be more competitive than new types. That is wholly unacceptable. The Commission has made a mistake, and it cannot expect us, or any other Government in the Community, to make right that which it has got wrong. This is an occasion when the House must unite. There are only a few of us in the Chamber, but I am sure that we speak for all those who would wish to be present.
The documentation includes phrases such as
proposal for a Council directive … Having regard to the proposal from the Commission … Having regard to the Opinion of the European Parliament … Having regard to the Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee",
but we are not told who is in favour of the proposal. We have bureaucratic propaganda trying to cover up a substantial mistake of the past. Of course we all make mistakes, and I am the first to acknowledge that I am among those who have made many mistakes. I only hope that I have not made too many in the House.
We have before us a proposal that includes a reduction in the space for the driver and a consequent deterioration in the comfort and safety of the driver's working area. Surely all hon. Members would agree that it is vital that the driver should give correct conduct to his vehicle. He must ensure the safety of his vehicle and therefore of all other vehicles on the road.
The proposal illustrates one of the many problems of the Commission, which is that it often separates its legalistic intentions and ambitions from what life is like, for example, on British roads and those of the other countries of the Community. What is the main reason for introducing the measure? The answer is to make right a wrong decision of the past. Safety standards must come first and last, and we should endorse that which the Government propose.

Mr. Bob Cryer: I find myself in the strange position of endorsing a Government proposition. It is not one in which I often find myself. They are right, however, to resist the proposal. I shall spend a few minutes explaining how the proposal came about.
There was a legislative loophole and the Commission, with its usual flexibility towards some member states, decided to extend all the limits by 1 m. That is extremely unfair, and, as a general harmonisation proposal, it should be resisted. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford (Mr. Lloyd) said, majority voting applies and we may find ourselves in a minority that is unable effectively to resist the proposal. The Government are being consistent with the Armitage proposals, which were debated by the House in 1973. Assurances were given by the then Minister that the increase of overall vehicle weight to 38 tonnes, with the accompanying dimensions, would be the limit to which the Government and successive Governments would go. It is unusual to find the Government being consistent and adhering to the assurances that were given when the Armitage proposals were debated.
Unfortunately, we are no longer our own masters. The Commission will be pressing for further harmonisation. As the Minister must know, there is a draft directive in the hands of the Commission that proposes an increase in dimensions and overall gross vehicle weight to 44 tonnes, with derogations for the United Kingdom and Ireland, but with limited time for them to operate. The United Kingdom and Ireland will be required to bring the derogrations to an end in a phasing-in period.
The draft directive, which we support the Government in resisting, is part of a process to harmonise road transport throughout the 12 EEC states. Our roads are already over-burdened. The cost of strengthening bridges and widening roads will be at least £1·5 billion. That will be spread over a number of years, because of the work involved.
In spite of that work, more expenditure would be required on a number of bypasses because many of our towns and villages cannot cope easily with the present size of juggernauts, let alone juggernauts that are 1 m longer. Far from making the driver's job easier, an extra metre will make the already difficult job of driving those vehicles even more difficult and a greater strain. Therefore, the Commission's proposal will not ease the task for drivers in


the United Kingdom: they will make the strain so much greater. That is another reason why we should resist the proposal.
Since the Armitage report was debated in Session 1982–83, the number of new registrations of lorries in the heaviest category—between 33 and 38 tonnes—increased 3,000 in 1983 and 8,400 in 1987. Over that period, there were 30,000 new registrations in the heaviest categories, and almost 800,000 new commercial vehicle registrations between 1983 and 1987. That means that there are nearly 1 million vehicles on our roads in the various categories ranging from 3·5 tonnes to 38 tonnes—the maximum vehicle capacity. Those figures are based on a reply that the Minister gave me on 13 May 1988.
Our roads are becoming choked with commercial and car traffic. To allow large vehicles would not necessarily produce fewer vehicles. The Armitage report stated that, with bigger vehicles, fewer vehicles would carry loads around. More miles would be covered by fewer vehicles. That simply has not happened, as the figures show.

Mr. Roger King: Do those figures represent net gains, or do they take account of the amount of scrapping that has occurred over the past few years?

Mr. Cryer: They do not take account of the amount of scrapping since 1983, although there would obviously have been some scrapping. My figures represent the number of new registrations since 1983 and they do not take account of a reduction because of scrapping. On our roads we see a fair range of age of commercial vehicles, which, by and large, seem to have a longer life than motor cars. Therefore, the commercial vehicle population seems to be more stable. No doubt the Minister will provide some background statistics if he has them to hand when he replies.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I do not have the figures to hand, because I thought that hon. Members on both sides of the House were opposing the draft directive. Also, I would have thought that the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer), with his usual skill, would have another of my parliamentary replies, which showed that the number of miles travelled had been reduced with the increase to 38 tonnes. We are not particularly concerned about the weight tonight. We are rightly concerned about dimensions. We should try to give a clear message to the Commission and to other member states that it is environmentally wrong, and in safety terms worse, to allow the proposed increases.

Mr. Cryer: I could not disagree with the Minister. However, I stress that the pressure for an extra metre on this type of vehicle is part of a general pattern. There is a move by the Commission to increase the overall weights of vehicles, so we must watch the proposals very carefully.
If we want to keep our roads reasonably free and accessible to other road vehicles and pedestrians, and give people who live along side roads in towns and villages some kind of a half-reasonable life, free from the pollution of road vehicle traffic, we must have some limit on the number and size of vehicles. Therefore, I endorse the Minister's view that we should not allow the vehicle size to be increased.
I have a brief from the Freight Transport Association. Why it should send one to me I have no idea, but it concludes by saying that the FTA
believes strongly that on questions of vehicle weights and dimensions it is essential for a harmonised regime to apply throughout the EC and would not want to see any exceptions made for the UK on articulated vehicle length.
I hope that there is not a powerful lobby within the Department of Transport wanting to accept a development in legislation that has occurred because of a breach and a warping of legislation.
I hope also that the Minister will resist the pressure that exists. When he says that both sides of the House are prepared to resist, he is right. However, I warn him that there are invidious influences pressing ahead.

Mr. Tony Lloyd: How does my hon. Friend interpret the evidence of Sir Alan Bailey, the Department of Transport's permanent secretary? He told the Public Accounts Committee that it was in the ministerial view most cost-effective to allow for the possibility of upgrading to 40 tonnes in setting the standards for reinforcement. Does my hon. Friend smell a rat on the Government's side?

Mr. Cryer: Yes, and my hon. Friend vividly and graphically illustrates a point of concern.
Many people regard the Minister's Department as the "Department of Road Transport", with railways playing a secondary role. It is true that many people have bought cars, that commercial vehicles provide a service, and that there have been changes over the past quarter of a century. Nevertheless, things are changing again. Nothing stays the same. Because of overcrowded roads, some road journeys are taking the time to complete that they did before motorways were introduced in the 1960s.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: That is rubbish.

Mr. Cryer: The Minister says that I am speaking absolute rubbish. That is not the case. In my own area of Bradford, some journeys take longer at peak times than they did a quarter of a century ago. I can tell the House from my own experience that that is the case. We know from our knowledge of the M25—as another example—that at certain times of the day journeys are taking longer than they did five or 10 years ago.
People are moving off the roads, which is very welcome, and on to the railways. In west Yorkshire, trains generally are crowded, so much so that British Rail is increasing fares to put people off travelling by rail. That is a generally accepted policy.

Madam Deputy Speaker (Miss Betty Boothroyd): Order. I remind the hon. Gentleman that we are not having a general debate on transport, but discussing a directive. Perhaps he will return to that subject.

Mr. Cryer: You are right, Madam Deputy Speaker.
I conclude by emphasising that we should resist the proposed extention in commercial vehicle lengths. We want to keep our environment as decent as burgeoning road traffic allows, but in pressing our case against the Commission's proposals we must not forget that we have an excellent railway system. If we are to safeguard our environment, we must seek ways of transferring traffic from the roads to rail. The Minister is nodding, and I hope that he will carry on nodding as I say that that also means keeping the 72 miles of railway from Settle to Carlisle.

Mr. Roger King: After that last comment, I shall keep my contribution very brief. I join the consensus by supporting my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mr. Warren) in resisting the directive, because it constitutes a back-door method of extending lorry lengths.
I cannot understand the EC's thinking. It says that it is necessary to stop the trend towards short cabs, small trailer wheels and strange dimensions within those trailers, so that the negative effects on health, safety, comfort and quality of transport can be reduced—whatever that means.
I cannot speak for European truck manufacturers, many of whose trucks are built in this country under licence as part of partnership arrangements, but looking at the directive's main objective—to improve safety and comfort of lorry cabs—one notes a strange platitude at the end of the explanatory memorandum:
The dimensions of the cabin are not fixed but incentives for the construction of short cabins are taken away since this would not result in an increase of loading space.
That will not make a difference. One of the most important aspects of lorry construction is vehicle weight. Designers and manufacturers will not put in a bigger cabin simply because there is a larger space, because that would add to the gross vehicle weight. Having acquired the expertise of building fairly small and ergonomically satisfactory cabs, manufacturers will not build bigger ones for the sake of piling sheet metal on to a vehicle. The directive's objective is misplaced. It asks designers to put the clock back and return to a bigger cab, which means more weight on the vehicle and a smaller payload.
The explanatory memorandum refers to
smaller wheels of trailers in order to gain loading space in height".
What is the problem with small wheels if they will stand up to the punishment of travelling along a motorway at fairly high speed? There seems to be no reason why a large truck with small wheels should not be filled with shredded wheat, which has an enormous volume. This recommendation is a pathetic example of trying unnecessarily to restrict operators' flexibility.
On internal dimensions, the explanatory memorandum refers to
thin wall equipment for refrigerated vehicles in order to gain loading space in width.
Why not, if the technology exists to use new materials and to put a bigger load on a semi-trailer? Of course, it must not go over the maximum permissible weight. However, what is to stop manufacturers from using space-age materials to provide better facilities? Why must we have legislation to prevent us from developing road transport systems? It is like putting the clock back.
I say, more power to my hon. Friend's elbow. There is nothing in the directive that improves safety or affects health or the comfort and quality of transport. Those aspects are in the designers' hands. Any trip to a commercial motor show, such as the one a few weeks ago, shows that the modern truck is a highly sophisticated piece of equipment, capable of providing comfort and quality of environment for the driver.
If we are to talk about extra lengths for lorries and semi-trailers and about higher gross vehicle weights, let us do so. Let us not ensure, by allowing the legislation to be passed unchallenged, that we get there by the back door, to the disadvantage of our road system.

Mr. Hugo Summerson: In view of the lateness of the hour relative to the early sitting of the House tomorrow, I shall confine myself to supporting my hon. Friend the Minister in his opposition to this disgraceful directive.

Mr. Peter Bottomley: I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Summerson) for his support. I wish that more colleagues on both sides of the House were as clear.
I am grateful to the hon. Members for Stretford (Mr. Lloyd) and for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) for their comments. My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. King) spoke with the greatest expertise. He said that the Community was not solving the problem that it set out to face. Perhaps we should copy the provision that the hon. Members for Bradford, South and for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) managed to put into the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974. In trying to improve safety, we should not do something that makes the position worse.
Clearly we want an ergonomically designed cab for drivers. One reason why road safety for drivers of heavy goods vehicles has improved is that they are more often treated like human beings. They are getting better cabs, but their provision is not always supported. Les Huckfield spoke against the provision of sleeper cabs, but for many drivers that is an advantage.
I emphasise that, in our view, what is being put forward in the draft directive is less safe and more environmentally damaging.

Mr. Tony Lloyd: The Minister is a member of the Transport and General Workers Union and he has always had the interests of the truck drivers at heart, but can he explain the difference between the way in which the European Community wants to tackle the size of cab and the way in which the British Government want to do it? In fact, it is identical. It is done by specifying a maximum trailer length and a maximum usable trailer length. The difference is the maximum possible cab length. If the Minister believes that that is unsatisfactory—that was the clear implication—I shall agree with him. If he introduces legislation that provides guaranteed minimum standards for cab drivers in terms of size of cabs, the Opposition will support it. Is that the way that the Government intend to go?

Mr. Bottomley: Yes. I suspect that other hon. Members will think that that was a planted question. I shall illustrate what I am about to say with my little lorry. We control the length of the semi-trailer. That allows, within the overall length, the cab size to be a proper length. I do not want to play with too many of my toys. I have a collection of them here, but I do not think that I ought to use too many of them. If, however, there are more axles on the prime mover, we reduce the damage to the road and make sure that there is greater safety. There is braking on both the drive axles, rather than on just one.
If the hon. Member for Stretford reads my opening speech, he will find that that is spelt out very clearly. We went further than the directive and made sure that there were no loopholes in the United Kingdom legislation. We wish that the European Community had done the same. It


is an example of perhaps sloppy negotiations leading to the current directive, which allows people to go further than was intended when the directive was approved.
In fact, it is worse than that. I have here Transport News Digest of November 1988, which gives a rundown on the month's important road freight news. It is headed "Supersize container plan by shippers" and says:
Plans are being laid by the shipping lines to introduce an additional supersize container on the international scene—49ft long, 2·6 metres wide and 2·9 metres high. Several American states have agreed to allow land movement of such big containers and the Dutch and West Germans are believed to be sympathetic in principle, although it would mean 17·5 metre long artics to do it … The shipping interests are attempting to put a stamp of respectability on their supersize container by calling for its consideration by the International Standards Organisation. But vehement opposition can be expected from many countries' transport ministers: You can carry supersizes by sea or rail if you can, but no way are they going on our roads, might sum up the frequent reaction.
That is certainly my reaction.
The hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) said that rail should be made as competitive as possible. Leaving aside his 72 miles of special pleading, my aim is to get as much freight on to the railways as is commercially viable. That is one reason why the Channel tunnel will provide great help. That is why we expect a greater proportion of freight to be carried by the railways.

Mr. Tony Lloyd: To London; that is all.

Mr. Bottomley: Beyond London, too, and through the Channel tunnel to the rest of Europe.
The hon. Member for Bradford, South also referred to the Armitage report, page 149, which deals with standard axles and damage numbers. It is important that he should understand the difference between a three-axle tractor and a two-axle tractor. I said earlier that we want to create no bias in favour of a two-axle tractor. If anything, we want a bias in favour of a three-axle tractor, as the third axle reduces road damage dramatically.
Britain is, I think, the only Community country with a taxation regime for heavy goods vehicles which fully covers the track costs. When other countries talk about tolls, as West Germany is apparently doing, and as Belgium did one year ago, they might start wondering whether they should analyse damage numbers and standard axles. They would find that the British approach is the right one.

Mr. Tony Lloyd: It is calculated that the Department of Transport's ineffectiveness at controlling overloading represents at least £50 million in damaged road costs each year which is not recovered in track costs. Although I accept in general what the Minister has said about road

maintenance, with bridges, which are the crucial part of the British road system, three-axle tractors do not necessarily alter the situation. It is quite possible to have all three axles on the bridge at the same time, and we must remember that it is the dynamic weight that matters with bridges.

Mr. Bottomley: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I am sure that, if he had not reminded me, I might have forgotten the answers I gave which probably provided the information that he has just fed back to me.
I do not intend to go into the question of majority voting, except to say that Italy, Portugal and Denmark are opposed to this draft directive. That is the good news. The bad news is that they, we and others are unlikely to agree about what would be better because different countries have different interests. We must use the blocking minority, although I do not think that it will come to that if it is seen that significant countries are opposed to the draft directive. We must also try to use the power of persuasion to establish what is right and make it possible.
I must tell my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Mr. Taylor) that if we concentrate too often on which directive we are considering—although that is necessary for some of our debates—we take our eye off establishing what is right and how to make it possible. I believe that we can provide leadership in Europe on covering and reducing track costs and on getting road casualties down. Whether we are approaching the matter from the point of view of road safety, environmental damage or the ergonomics of the cab, which my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mr. Warren) mentioned—he also made a passing reference to a bypass that he would like built—

Mr. Warren: Two bypasses.

Mr. Bottomley: Two! I should not have spoken again. Each time I speak my hon. Friend wants an extra one.
Hon. Members have reinforced the leadership provided by the Government in saying that the draft directive is counter-productive, that the Commission has identified the problem—the exploitation of a loophole by some countries—but that it has come up with the wrong solution. I ask the House to support the Government's lead. We must see whether we can do better.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That this House takes note of European Community Document No. 6882/88 on the dimensions of articulated vehicles; and endorses the Government's objective of resisting this proposed directive on the grounds that longer articulated vehicles would present significant environmental disadvantages to the United Kingdom.

The Borders (Rural Development)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Dorrell]

Mr. Archie Kirkwood: My right hon. Friend the Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Mr. Steel) and I wish to raise the issue of rural development in the Borders in this, the last Adjournment debate of this parliamentary Session.
The significance of the subject goes beyond the Borders region. I am sure that the Minister knows that the European Parliament meets later this week to decide a new set of criteria for the distribution of European Community structural funds to rural areas throughout the EC. The final policy will be ratified by the Council of Ministers by the end of this year. It is therefore important that the House should know what view Scottish Office Ministers will take on assistance to rural areas.
We all recognise that the Government's guiding economic philosophy is a free rein for market forces. Presumably that also applies to rural economies. The difficulty is that areas almost identical to the Borders, such as the Highlands and Islands, have assistance and support via a combination of private and public bodies and authorities. In such areas, help is not only available; it is proving extremely successful.
The first question for the Government is: why is the Borders region being left out? Our needs may be different from those of inner cities or of peripheral housing estates in the central belt, but they are no less great and are not substantially different from those of areas such as the Highlands and Islands.
A number of very worrying trends are appearing in the economy of the Borders. Local agriculture is beset with uncertainty about the future. As the Minister is aware, the changes in the system of support for beef and sheepmeat, moving away from support for the finished animal to premiums for breeding sheep stock and reared cattle, is causing widespread insecurity among the farming community in the Borders.
It is now being said that in western Berwickshire today one can drive for 30 miles through farms that are for sale. More than 60 farm units have been sold this calendar year in the region. The upland units—those between the hill farms and the lower ground units—are no longer viable. Those farms carry livestock and have no viable alternative sources of income. The uncertainty of the European Community changes in the variable beef premium and the sheepmeat regime is certainly taking a very heavy toll of the industry, which forms the backbone of our rural communities. Some of those communities are now at risk.
Do the Government recognise the problem? If they do, what steps are in hand to compensate the agricultural community for the inevitable reduction in European Community support in future?
In the commercial and industrial sectors, the situation is not much more secure. The combination of interest and exchange rate fluctuations and the imminent prospect of a uniform business rate is causing problems. Everyone in the Borders recognises that manufacturing capacity is far too heavily concentrated in textiles and electronics, and there is an urgent need to diversify employment opportunities, with all the consequences that would flow from that in

terms of education and training. If the knitwear industry went into recession, the economy in major centres of population, such as Hawick, would collapse.
What are the Government doing to co-ordinate and assist the work of the various agencies, public and private, that already carry out such work? The Borders region has no urban programme assistance, no "Business in the Community" organisation and no enterprise trusts; it relies exclusively on the work of the local authorities and the Scottish Development Agency.
If it is difficult for manufacturing industry, it is even more difficult for the self-employed and those who run small rural businesses. In addition, the demographic change in the age structure of the population will exacerbate the difficulties. A smaller proportion of the work force will be economically active and there will be greater demand for local health and social service systems for the elderly who live in the more remote parts of the area with little or no public services.
The whole rural infrastructure of the region is under increasing pressure. The regional council is undertaking a survey of local shopping patterns. Small high-street shops and post offices are threatened. Control of Lowland Scottish may leave the area if the bus group privatisation plans amalgamate the company with Eastern Scottish. Local school rolls are falling, and school transportation generally presents difficulty for families in country areas.
Those are all classical examples of a situation which produces depopulation, which is evident in my constituency in areas such as Cranshaws and Craik, Liddesdale, Hutton and Paxton, and which is causing concern locally.
I recognise the work done by the regional council planning department in conjunction with the recently devolved local Scottish Development Agency office. I commend the work that they do. They work well together and the people are of a high calibre. They have made considerable strides in the right direction. They are certainly aware of the problems, but they have limited means and a restricted remit.
What needs to be done can only be done by the Government, acting within the framework of a rural development agency which would be given specific power to operate in rural areas to retain the services and facilities that still exist, to take initiatives to help pump-prime new small businesses and to oversee future major developments. There are dozens of examples to illustrate what could be achieved in the Borders and is being achieved in other areas.
At local level, the post office at Roberton in the Borthwick valley is rumoured to be threatened by a substantial reduction in its hours of opening. A rural development agency could find quick ways to ensure the survival of such a vital service.
At regional level, there is a demonstrable need to maintain and repair timber extraction roads. Previously, European grants were available. Because we no longer have development status, the grants are no longer available. A rural development agency could make specific grants where timber extraction accelerated the need for road repairs.
At national level, there is a need to extend Eyemouth harbour. That would be a considerable asset to the entire Scottish fishing fleet. Pressure already exists in the local coastal communities on the Berwickshire coast, where the way of life is being threatened by diminishing catches and


financial returns. The inshore fleet and the shellfish sector would benefit, as would the storage and processing industries, if the new harbour were to be built. A rural development agency could contribute to making that new harbour a reality.
Other examples in tourism and food processing could be quoted. For example, there is a worthwhile plan doing the rounds in the agricultural community in the Borders region, the object of which is to set up a Borders sheep marketing group. It could lead to the setting up of some meat processing facilities which could have a major and positive impact on the local economy. The list is almost infinite. I could rehearse many ideas and examples from discussions I am having within the Borders region with the various interest groups. Those that I have mentioned should suffice to make the point.
I advocate making the Borders region a rural development area. I know that the Minister has corresponded with the convenor of the Borders regional council and that his hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries (Sir H. Monro) and his regional council have played a notable part in arguing for a rural development fund to be set up in their areas.
If the Government set their face against that and refuse to concede some such status, they will have to say why. They will also have to say why we, in the Borders, are being treated differently from other similar areas in the United Kingdom. There is a strong case for the Borders region to be a potentially eligible area, under objective 5b of the new formula, for European structural funds. If the Government refuse to back the region's claim, they will have to explain why they consistently fail to recognise the need to co-ordinate and fund an integrated plan to rejuvenate rural life in the Borders region and to counter the real threat of rural depopulation.

Mr. David Steel: I commend the persistence and initiative of my hon. Friend the Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) in securing this Adjournment debate, and I am grateful to him for allowing me two or three minutes to underline one of the points that he made and to add two others. I wholly support his plea for the Borders to be granted rural development status. Much more immediately, the Government must give a positive response to the Community's revisions of its structural funds.
The Minister will appreciate that, since the removal of development area status in 1980, we have suffered from the fact that development area status exists in high unemployment areas. It is therefore difficult to compete for the attraction of new industry. Considerable opportunities are offered in the Highlands and Islands by the development board, and excellent work is being done in Northumberland by the Development Commission. We are landed between those opportunities, attempting to compete for economic development with no outside assistance. We are placing high hopes on the new wider definition of objectives and we look to the Scottish Office to push the case for the Borders which has been well prepared by the Borders regional council.
I do not want to dwell on this in my brief intervention, but the closure of the mill at Walkerburn in my constituency showed that it is difficult to get a quick response from the Scottish Development Agency because

its powers are severely limited. I shall say no more about that because negotiations for purchase of the mill are at a critical stage.
I wish that we could wring from the Government an undertaking for which we have asked several times—that when the South of Scotland electricity board is privatised there will be the same policy requirement in the south of Scotland as there is in the north for common pricing in rural areas. Without such a guarantee, the cost of electricity supply and repair; in rural areas is likely to be greatly increased. I cannot understand why rural areas in the north of Scotland should be treated more favourably than those in the south. I hope that the Government will eventually give that undertaking.
The Minister will know—he gave me a long written answer on Friday— that I am concerned about the way in which, suddenly, factoring of Scottish special housing in the Borders has been removed from local authorities, without any reason being given, and handed over, in my constituency, to a trust that does not yet exist. It is a most extraordinary procedure. I am pursuing the matter with the Scottish Special Housing Association and do not expect the Minister to reply to it tonight.
Housing is the main function of district councils in the Borders. They do not enjoy the powers of other district councils in Scotland. To continue eroding the powers and authority of local government is a mistake when we are looking forward to the possibility of assisting the growth and development of the Borders economy with the help of local authorities and through the previous co-ordination that we had for the development of new housing where it is needed. I am concerned that the drift to the private sector may rob local authorities of the chance to direct housing as part of economic development in the rural areas in the future.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Lord James Douglas-Hamilton): I congratulate most warmly the hon. Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) on obtaining this Adjournment debate. He has raised a number of issues on behalf of his constituents and I shall attempt to respond to all of them. I have made the Secretary of State aware of the points that he made about bus privatisation. Between 1981 and 1987 the population of the Borders increased substantially.
The right hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Mr. Steele) mentioned housing. I shall follow up the point that he made about the South of Scotland electricity board and ensure that he receives a letter about it.
There has been no disposal of housing, as the right hon. Gentleman acknowledged. The SSHA has agreed in principle to enter into arrangements with Waverley housing trust only for the management or factoring of its Borders stock. These changes do not require the approval or consent of the Secretary of State. I was, of course, advised of the nature of the arrangement proposed, because of the wider policy implications, and have been assured that the SSHA council of management has satisfied itself that the arrangement will constitute good value for money.
Secondly, final decisions on the financial arrangements have not yet been made and will depend on the total


number of houses managed by Waverley housing trust at any time. The cost will, however, have to take into account the very different nature of the arrangement proposed by Waverley housing trust, so that this provides good value for money in relation to the standards of service to be provided for the tenants. I understand that there has been wide dissatisfaction among SSHA tenants in the Borders area about the standard of service provided in the past. I can therefore confirm that we are prepared to respond, through an adjustment to the grant in aid for Scottish Homes, to meet any modest increases in the cost of new management arrangements which might prove more satisfactory.
Thirdly, there is no question of the association being required to consult the tenants on a change in the factoring or management arrangements. The association has statutory responsibilities as landlord towards its tenants. It is for the SSHA, as landlord, to make appropriate management arrangements so that these obligations are fulfilled, and it is not customary to consult tenants on such matters.
In that respect the proposed arrangement between the SSHA and Waverley offers no firm commitment on future purchase of the housing stock. Any such proposals would be a matter for the SSHA or Scottish Homes in the first instance, but would also require the consent of my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State. I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that such consent would be withheld unless the principles set out in the guidelines by the Scottish Development Department on voluntary disposals of stock by local authorities were properly reflected. In particular, my right hon. and learned Friend would be concerned to be assured that the tenants had been fully consulted in accordance with the provisions set out in clause 135 of the Housing Bill, which is likely to become an Act tomorrow.
Finally, I have made it clear that neither the provisions of the Housing Bill nor the separate provisions in the Housing (Scotland) Act 1988 in any way derogate from the current rights of secured tenants of the SSHA or any other public sector landlord. The new legislation will have specific safeguards by ensuring that tenants are fully consulted and have the opportunity of presenting their views.
The hon. Member's speech tended to dwell on what he sees as limits in the region's ability to diversify its economy, rather than on its potential and how best to exploit its natural assets. For example, he referred to the Borders status as a non-assisted area.
As the hon. Gentleman knows, the purpose of the Government's regional policy is to stimulate enterprise and wealth creation and to reduce inequalities in employment opportunities. Regional assistance is therefore directed to areas of greatest relative need as identified on the assisted area map. Assisted area designation is based mainly, but not wholly, on unemployment factors, and it is against such criteria that the Borders do not have assisted area status. The unemployment rates in the Borders, at 6·9 per cent., are well below the Scottish average of 12·8 per cent. and below the current average of 13·8 per cent. for assisted areas with intermediate status. There is therefore no strong case for amending the present designation.
I know that one of the attractions to the region of securing assisted area status is the belief that it would render the area eligible for support from the European Community's regional development fund. The new regulations governing the structural funds are currently the subject of intense negotiations in Brussels and we are negotiating hard to protect our interests. The Borders region has asked for a case to be presented to the European Commission in support of its claim for Community assistance as a rural area under the new regulations. We shall consider these claims, and those of other non-assisted areas, once the new regulations have been finalised. Funds available for such areas will, however, be limited—some estimates suggest 2 per cent. of the structural funds—and concentration on the most needy areas will inevitably be necessary.
As an alternative to assisted area status, it has been suggested that the entire Borders region be designated a rural development area. The hon. Gentleman echoed that argument in making a plea for a rural development agency. The benefits are usually seen as providing access to further financial assistance from the Government or the European Community and ensuring closer co-operation between those public bodies active in encouraging economic development. But we must be extremely clear about what additional benefits we hope to gain before we could be justified in following the rural development area route.
I am sceptical about whether such a designation would have any relevance in Scottish circumstances, even if the entire region could qualify. Unless it was combined with designation as an assisted area, rural development area status would not render the Borders region eligible for any more Government or EC support than it already receives, and, as I have already suggested. there is no compelling case for adjusting the present assisted area map.
As to improving the co-ordination of development effort in the region, I would, in principle, welcome any such improvement, but I must ask why that cannot be done within the existing mechanisms. What is to prevent the local authorities, the Scottish Development Agency and others from building on the existing relationships to improve the service to rural communities in the Borders?

Mr. Kirkwood: They have no money.

Lord James Douglas-Hamilton: The Scottish Development Agency has substantial funds, and I shall give the House some examples of what it is doing. We have often stressed the importance that we attach to the agency playing an active role in rural areas, and I know that that is acceptable to the agency's board.
The recent reorganisation of the SDA on to a regional basis is intended to improve the delivery of its services to its customers. A new expanded Borders office was opened in the summer by the right hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale. That office provides a one-door approach to all the SDA services: access to the agency's business development activities, investment functions, enterprise initiative schemes, property development and management, improving derelict land and other environmental work. Individual projects include its work at Newcastleton, in the hon. Gentleman's constituency, where it is working with the local community to reverse the


decline in population and improve the local economy by improving the environment and supporting local businesses.
In Berwickshire, the agency is working with the regional council to identify and encourage areas of economic growth. In Galashiels, those partners are looking at ways of improving the physical and business opportunities in the town centre. Throughout the region, the agency, the regional council, the Scottish tourist board and others are studying how to exploit the tourism potential of the area. The agency owns and manages more than 50 properties in the Borders, working with the local authority on specific accommodation problems. An example is the estate at Tweedbank, where all the units have been allocated, with a similar development expected to begin construction in early 1989.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned Eyemouth. The agency maintains a close interest in the proposals for the redevelopment of Eyemouth harbour. I note the hon. Gentleman's strong support for the project. The application for assistance has just been submitted to the Scottish Office for support. It is under active consideration.
The hon. Gentleman also mentioned food processing. I understand that the Borders regional council and the SDA have examined the scope for providing added value to the region's agriculture industry by introducing food processing industries. The study's findings are under consideration by both bodies, but it shows the close co-operation that already exists.
Those are just some examples of how the SDA is working to improve the Borders economy and the close links that it enjoys with the local authorities and others—

Mr. Kirkwood: But it does not have any money.

Lord James Douglas-Hamilton: I am aware that the hon. Gentleman is worried about the funds. I shall draw that point to the attention of the SDA.
The SDA is well placed and well equipped to perform the tasks that it has been given by the Government, enabling it to work with the local community in promoting the Borders economy. It will be happy to give advice and assistance, where appropriate, to small businesses in the region. I hope that the extensive range of support that is available will be of great assistance.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned training. The Training Agency is actively working to increase the level of training throughout the country, and I am sure that it will be interested to learn of any specific problems affecting rural businesses. I suggest that the hon. Gentleman's constituents might like to contact the nearest Training Agency office, whose staff will be happy to solve any problems. Both the SDA and the Training Agency are there to help.
The provision of general infrastructure is largely a matter for the local authorities. The particular needs of rural areas are recognised in the allocations that they receive. In the present year, the Borders region's capital allocations total some £8 million and are projected to rise to £9·3 million by 1990–91. We fully acknowledge the special problems of housing in rural areas. That is why rural authorities already receive a greater share of resources available, compared to the scale of their housing stock, than do others. However, in these areas, more than anywhere else, local circumstances have to be considered and it is for local authorities, housing associations and others to determine how best to meet the needs of their areas.
It is refreshing to see how much the population in the Borders region has grown. In the perids 1971 to 1981 and 1981 to 1987, even in Roxburgh district, where the population fell slightly, the rate of decline was less than for the whole of Scotland. I acknowledge that specific problems remain, but depopulation is no longer a serious problem, except in the remote parts of the area, where there continues to be some difficulty. The Borders region is extremely attractive to tourists, and I hope that tourism will be strongly encouraged. This is one of the most beautiful parts of the world.
The Government are aware of the process of change affecting the Borders region and other rural areas. Our task is not to resist such changes, but to manage them to the benefit of the people who live and work in rural areas. That challenge is being met through agricultural diversification and the resources provided to the Scottish development agency, the local authorities and others to promote the growth and diversification of the rural economy. The mechanisms for support are well placed to help the Borders region develop its economy from the strong base that it currently enjoys. I would encourage local people to make full use of those mechanisms to secure the future of their communities.
Under the rural transport innovation grant scheme, the Secretary of State may authorise grants for the establishment, continuance or improvement of public passenger transport services for the benefit of a local community. Two applications have been received from the Borders region. One of these, the Southdean and Hobkirk community bus, was successful, and received a small capital grant. We are now actively considering with colleagues in the Department of the Environment, who administer similar schemes, how to achieve greater take-up of the resources available. If the hon. Gentleman has any ideas about this, I strongly urge that they be followed up.

The motion having been made after Ten o'clock on Monday evening, and the debate having continued for half an hour, MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at seventeen minutes past One o'clock.